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NORMAN

ADVENT URIS

Dwellers of

by DON WILCOX

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NOTE HOW LISTERINE
GARGLE REDUCED GERMS

1 he two drawings illustrate height 01
range in germ reductions on mouth anti
throat surfaces in test cases before and
after gargling Listerine Antiseptic.
Fifteen minutes after gargling,
reductions up to tUi.T'.'v were noted
and even one hour after,
were still reduced as much as 80 r ,

A Cold Is An Infection, Treat It As
Such With Germ-Killing Action

Tests showed that Listerine Antiseptic
reduced surface germs as much as
9S.7% even IS minutes after the gargle;
up to 80% one hour later.

Often the prompt and frequent use of Lis-
terine Antiseptic helps old Mother Nature to
combat a cold before it becomes serious.

Here’s one reason why, we believe.

Listerine Antiseptic reaches way back on
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action explains its amazing test record against

colds during a period of 10 years.

Remember that in clinical tests made during
these 10 years:

Regular twice-a-day users of Listerine actually
bad fewer colds , shorter colds, and milder colds tbar,
those who did not gargle with it.

So, when you feel a cold coming on, gargle
with full strength Listerine Antiseptic — quick
and often. You may save yourself a long siege
of trouble.

Lambert Pharmacal Company, St. Louis, Mo.

GARGLE

LISTERINE-QWCff/

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

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(fwdjwlA. fl&v dphiL, 1942

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP (Novel) by Don Wilcox 8

Bill Pierce saw his qlr! pulled overboard by weird horse-fish, and followed into a new civilization.

CRIME CLEAN-UP IN CENTER CITY
(Novelet) by Robert Moore Williams 54

Grady and Waller were good cops. This crime wave had to be cleaned up; so they nabbed the kingpin!

BULL MOOSE OF BABYLON (Novel) by Don Wilcox 70

Hal Norton didn't expect to be hurled into the midst of a Babylonian battlefield, but there he was —

THE ETERNAL PRIESTESS (Short) by Harold Lawlor 108

"You must believe in me!" begged T'Risha. But to Terry Leach, her story was a bit hard to swallow.

DOUBLE IN DEATH (Short). . by Gerald Vance ...... 120

"It is a perfect set-up," murmured Colegrave. "My alter-ego kills a man — I am safe from punishment!"

OSCAR AND THE TALKING TOTEMS
(Novelet) by James Norman 130

Totem poles dotted the Alaskan territory; and to Oscar of Mars they spoke of catastrophe to America.

HOK VISITS THE LAND OF LEGENDS
(Novelet) by Manly Wade Wellman 154

Hok wanted adventure; so he set out to visit the land of legends, and got more than he bargained for.

TIME WOUNDS ALL HEELS (Short) by Robert Bloch ...... 192

Lefty Feep certainly walked into trouble when he went to the picnic of the Society of Diminutives!

BERTIE AND THE BLACK ARTS (Short) . . by William P. MeGivern 206

Bertie wanted to reform, marry, settle down; but how could he do it with demons following him around?

THE LEGEND OF MARK SHAYNE (Short) . by John York Cabot ... 224

Mark Shayne had a contract — and he demanded fulfilment even after death; songs written by a ghost!

The Editor's Notebook
$32,000 Waiting for Owners

Monster Beavers

Pain in an Amputated Leg .
Romance of the Elements .

FEATURES

Oddities of Science 191

Introducing the Authors ... 233
Amazing Stories Quarterly. . 234

Reader's Page 235

Correspondence Corner . 241

Cover painting by Malcolm Smith illustrating a scene from "Dwellers of the Deep." Illustrations by
Malcolm Smith; Virgil Finlay; Julian S. Krupa; Rod Ruth; Ned Hadley; Jay Jackson: Joe Sewell

ZIFF-DAVIS PUBLISHING COMPANY
Member of the Audit Bureau of Circulations

William B, Ziff, Publisher; B. G. Davis, Editor; Raymond A. Palmer, Managing Editor;

Herman R. Bollln. Art Director; H. G. Strong, Circulation Director

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The names of all characters that are used In short stories, serials and semi-fiction articles that deal with types
are fictitious. Use of a name that is the same as that of any living person Is coincidental.

FANTASTIC FANTASTIC ADVENTURES Is published monthly by ZIFF-DAVIS PUBLISHING COM- VOLUME 4,

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FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

DO THE DEAD RETURN ?

A strange man in Los Angeles, known
as “The Voice of Two Worlds,” tells of
astonishing experiences in far-off and
mysterious Tibet, often called the land of
miracles by the few travelers permitted to
visit it. Here he lived among the lamas,
mystic priests of the temple. “In your pre-
vious lifetime,” a very old lama told him,
“you lived here, a lama in this temple.
You and I were boys together. I lived on,
but you died in youth, and were reborn in
England. I have been expecting your
return.”

The young Englishman was amazed as
he looked around the temple where he was
believed to have lived and died. It seemed
uncannily familiar, he appeared to know
every nook and corner of it, yet — at least
in this lifetime — he had never been there
before. And mysterious was the set of
circumstances that had brought him.
Could it be a case of reincarnation, that
strange belief of the East that souls re-
turn to earth again and again, living many
lifetimes?

Because of their belief that he had
formerly been a lama in the temple, the
lamas welcomed the young man with open
arms and taught him rare mysteries and
long-hidden practices, closely guarded for
.-three thousand years by the sages, which
have enabled many to perform amazing
feats. He says that the system often leads
to almost unbelievable improvement in
power of mind, can be used to achieve
brilliant business and professional success
as well as great happiness. The young man
himself later became a noted explorer and
geographer, a successful publisher of maps

and atlases of the Far East, used through-
out the world.

“There is in all men a sleeping giant of
mindpower,” he says. “When awakened,
it can make man capable of surprising
feats, from the prolonging of youth to
success in many other worthy endeavors.”
The system is said by many to promote
improvement in health; others tell of in-
creased bodily strength, courage and
poise.

“The time has come for this long-
hidden system to be disclosed to the
Western world,” declares the author, and
offers to send his amazing 9000 word
treatise — which reveals many startling re-
sults — to sincere readers of this publica-
tion, free of cost or obligation. For your
free copy, address the Institute of Mental-
physics, 213 South Hobart Blvd., Dept
92L, Los Angeles, Calif. Readers are
urged to write promptly, as only a limited
number of the free treatises have been
printed.

A LONG about the end of this department
you will find a steam calliope and twelve
gigantic royal blue Malayan elephants,
bearing enormous teak logs, ornately carved, and
blessed by the high priest of the all high stuff.
The purpose of all this enormous pomp and ac-
tivity is to build a royal throne upon which will
sit a lovely Mac Girl, and in her lap will repose
this copy of Fantastic Adventures, as our per-
sonal gift to you !

Here you are, readers! A giant-size Fantastic
Adventures; 244 pages of your favorite magazine.
A complete surprise, to be sure, to us as well as
to you. But the other day we happened to see
a copy of our companion magazine, Amazing
Stories, and we got jealous. Why not make Fan-
tastic the same size, said we? Why shouldn’t
our readers get a special issue too? They are
just as fine people as the readers of Amazing —
and how! and so . . .

Well there you are. If you can find anything
better in the fantasy field, please tell Ripley. He’ll
be interested — and we won’t believe it.

PRESENTING this big special issue isn’t all
we’ve done. We’ve got the swellest treats be-

tween two covers you’ve ever seen. We’ll just
point out a few to begin with.

Number one— rthe cover: Malcolm Smith pre-
sents his first work in Fantastic Adventures, a
cover painting which served as the inspiration for
one of the finest stories Don Wilcox has done
in recent months. This new artist scored a hit'
in Amazing Stories for January, with ‘‘The Test
Tube Girl” and now he takes over this maga-
zine. And he’ll be back. We have four mag-
nificent covers on hand by this artist, and each
one has served to inspire one of your favorite
authors to write a pretty fine yam.

DJUMBER two — “Dwellers Of The Deep”:
^ ' Some times we wonder how anybody can
come out of a stuffy little country school, and
reveal such a startling imagination, and such a
deft dramatic touch. We are only happy that
Don Wilcox turned his envied talents to pulp fic-
tion, and especially to us. Here we have a story
that is as different an undersea tale as has ever
been written. And we think you’ll agree with
us wholeheartedly.

TTERE we should say number three, but that
^ -*■ paragraph opening is getting a bit deadly.
So we’ll be trite and just say: next!

But if you think it’s trite to tell you that
Manly Wade Wellman, who is now serving his
Uncle Sammy, is in this issue with another of
his very popular Hok the Caveman stories, you’re
distinctly on the damp side. Originally we ran
this series in Amazing Stories. That was before
Fantastic Adventures came into its own. Many
readers pointed out that this character was more
suited to this magazine. So, by popular request,
we switched. And when you read “Hok Visits
The Land Of Legends” you will be reading the
best of a series that has rivaled even the famous
Adam Link. (P.S. Adam Link is in the current
Amazing Stories, which ought to be tip enough !)

INTRODUCING another author: Harold Law-

lor. Harold is somewhat of a protege of Don
Wilcox. He’s tried us before, but he’s finally sold
us. And we’re quite anxious to know what you
think of him. It seems Don has gone back to teach-
ing, and personally, we think he’s done a right
fine job. So, here’s another author’s “first” in
our pages. We don’t think it will be the last.
The title is “The Eternal Priestess”.

(Continued on page 68)

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DWEUERS
Of THE VEEP

by DON WILCOX

Pierce went into the deep to
find Bea Riley, kidnaped and
drowned by a weird fish race

B ILL PIERCE was hurrying up to
the deck to keep a date when
the alarm sounded.

“Girl overboard! Girl overboard!”
The whistles blew, the big liner
churned waters, and began to circle.
It would take several minutes for it
to stop. Meanwhile everybody scam-
pered to the rail to look for the girl
who had gone over.

“It’s your gal friend, Pierce,” some
fellow-passenger yelled.

Bill Pierce tore off his coat, kicked off
his shoes, leaped to rail.

The girl was a full hundred and fifty

yards away. Her arms were fighting the
water frantically. Strange behavior for
Beatrice Riley, swimming champion.

Bill dived. In a moment he was skim-
ming through the waves with a power-
ful stroke.

“Hold on, Bea!”

His cry was probably lost in the
clamor. Ringing in his ears were the
cynical words of some passenger.
“Publicity stunt!”

Bill Pierce didn’t believe it. The
diving team of Pierce and Riley didn’t
need publicity, and Bea Riley wasn’t
one to pull a cheap hoax.

Bill caught sight of her. He was less
than fifty feet away. He saw her
eyes widened as if in pain. Her arms
jerked upward helplessly, she sank
down.

With all his championship speed Bill

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

Pierce was too late. Or was he?

“That’s the spot!” someone yelled at
him from an approaching boat.

He surface dived, combed the waters
as far as his keen eyesight would reach.

Moments later he came up. But there
was no sign of Beatrice Riley.

Sailors dived from the life boat, now,
and Bill Pierce, catching half a breath,
went down for another search.

He spiralled, downward, so deep now
that green tropical waters grew black
against his wide-open eyes. The ham-
mering pressure of the water pounded
at his brain. He was baffled by the
strangeness of this occurrence.

Now and again he would catch sight
of some vague form sliding past, deep
beneath him, only to dart away at his
approach.

He bounded to the surface gasping
for breath.

“Muff said he saw her,” one of the
sailors yelled. “He said some fish had
her. They were pullin’ her — ”

“That sounds like Muff,” another
sailor growled. “He’d lie to you if your
life depended — ”

“Which way did he see her?” Pierce
snapped.

Someone pointed, and Bill Pierce
shot down again.

But when he was forced up he had
failed once more.

“Who was it saw her?” he demanded.

“Just some o’ Windy Muff’s talk,”
said a sailor deprecatingly.

“But I did!” a red-headed sailor de-
clared hotly. “I saw a bunch o’ fish
clap a glass barrel over her — ”

The sailors roared him down. This
was no time for any of his wild lies.

“But I saw it!” Windy Muff blazed.
“Just like I said, the fish had a barrel

Pop! Someone slapped him across
the mouth, muttering, “Can’t you see
this fellow’s cut up over her? Save

your damn’ jokin’ for another time.J

“But I’m not jokin’ — ”

'T'HEY cut him off, and one of the
A sailors explained to Bill Pierce that
anything the red-haired Windy Muff
said seriously could be taken as a lie
right out of thin air.

A whistle from the liner called them
back. No more time could be spared
on a lost cause. Thirty minutes had
been lost.

Pierce tried to plunge again, but the
sailors grabbed him, hauled him into
the lifeboat. . . .

Back in his stateroom again, as the
liner’s engines rumbled into full speed
ahead, Bill Pierce went through the
routine of changing into dry clothes.
He moved numbly. The sudden inex-
plicable tragedy had dulled his senses.

A knock sounded at his door. It
was a steward.

“The captain wishes to see you in his
office, sir.”

“The captain?”

“Can you make it right away, sir?”

“Yes. But first— get a wireless off
for me.” Bill scribbled a brief message,
addressed it to George Vinson in Hon-
olulu. “My friend Vin will find this
hard to believe. I can hardly realize it
myself.”

A moment later Bill Pierce entered
the office, dropped into the chair across
from the captain’s desk, agreed to an-
swer a few questions to the best of
his ability.

“I’ve learned that the girl was pulled
overboard,” said the captain. “Do you
have any explanation?”

“Pulled?” Pierce tried to shake the
dizziness from his brain. The heavy
weight of grief was on him.

“They tell me that a rope— or some-
thing resembling a rope — was looped
around her” arms and waist, and the
other end led down to the water.”

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP

Bill Pierce gave a bitter snort. “That
red-haired sailor is a swift liar, isn’t he?
Out in the lifeboat he was seeing fish
run away with her in a transparent
tub,”

“Anything that Windy Muff says can
be taken with barrels of salt,” said the
captain. “We’ve heard too many of his
stories. But this rope — well, three pas-
sengers saw it.”

“Oh, they must be mistaken,” Pierce
clipped his words with temper. “If
they’re trying to cook up a suicide — ”

“Not so fast, Mr. Pierce,” the cap-
tain cut in with a heavy scowl. “No-
body’s trying to cook up anything.
We’re after the facts. What kind of
rope do you think Miss Riley might
have used?”

Pierce narrowed his eyes. “Begging
your pardon, but I think you’re off
your nut.”

The captain’s scowl tightened.

“Maybe I am, Pierce, but I can’t
ignore the evidence. Three passengers
substantially agreed on their stories.
Miss Riley was standing at the rail, they
said, when they suddenly noticed a cord
stretching up from the surface of the
water. They saw the loop jerk tight
around her shoulders and pull her over
the rail into the ocean.”

“TT DOESN’T make sense,” Pierce
paced the floor, snapping his fin-
gers.

“By the time the alarm sounded her
arms had evidently fought free of the
rope — ”

“That proves it was no suicide.”
“But the cord evidently caught
her feet and the weight pulled her to the
bottom.”

..“What weight?” Pierce was angry.
“Did anyone see a weight? . . . Did
anyone see her pull the loop around her
arms? . . Well, what’s the answer?”

“We’re obscure on those points,

Pierce. I’ve got my men searching
for anything that might have been used
for a drop-weight.”

“Drop-weight, hell. How, in broad
daylight, could Beatrice Riley or any-
one else drop some object into the ocean
without anyone seeing it fall?”

The captain had no ready answer.
But he faced Pierce with an accusing
look. His suspicions were running
rampant.

“Answer me carefully, Pierce,” he
said. “Did you and Beatrice Riley
quarrel last night?”

“Well, I’ll be dam — your honor,
what’s the sense of that question?”
“Calm down, Pierce,” said the cap-
tain. “What you say is being recorded
by my secretary in the next room. I
won’t pry into your personal affairs any
deeper than necessary. But if — as a
few passengers have testified, you and
Beatrice Riley were arguing — ”

“It was nothing serious — just a dis-
cussion — ”

“You’ll be doing yourself a service,”
said the captain, “if you’ll relate to me
what you can recall of that discussion.
That’s the simplest way to clear your-
self of any suspicion of murder.”

For a moment Bill Pierce was white
with rage, tensing his muscles to hold
himself in check.

Then he saw his reflection in a
panel mirror, and the fury in his cold
eyes rebuked him. An outburst of tem-
per was no way to ward off the captain’s
suspicions.

Pierce drew a deep breath, sat down,
after a moment managed to speak
calmly.

“Okay, captain. I’ll tell you what
we talked about. I might as well. I’d
be thinking about it anyhow, now that
she’s gone . . . Last night when I met
her on the deck I told her I’d just re-
ceived a radiogram . .

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

CHAPTER II

npHAT previous evening when Bill
Pierce had received a radiogram he
had hurried around the deck to find
Beatrice.

She wasn’t going to like this, he was
sure. The telegram was from his friend
George Vinson. Beatrice had no use
for Vinson. She held an unaccountable
dislike for him.

“Just my luck,” Bill Pierce had said
to himself.

Bill was madly in love with Beatrice
Her mysterious nature always held him
at a distance. But he was determined
to slip a ring on her finger before they
reached Honolulu.

Now with the Hawiian Islands less
than two days off, this had to happen.

George Vinson had radiographed
from Hawaii. He would be there to
meet them. Morover, he wanted to
take them on to South America on his
yacht.

Bill Pierce knew Bea would never
hear to it.

Now Bill came upon Beatrice loung-
ing in a deck chair. She was dressed
in her sporty blue and white, looking'
as beautiful as Bill Pierce had ever seen
her— and that was saying a lot,

“A surprise radiogram for us, Bea.”

“Not from George Vinson?” she
asked apprehensively.

“Good old Vin,” Bill smiled. “Are
you in the mood? There, there, don’t
frown so. It spoils your pretty face.”

He handed her the radiogram,
watched her expression as she read it.

The mystery in Beatrice Riley’s face
was ever present. It was something
Bill would dream about at night and
read about in the Sunday sports re-
views. It was something that everyone
remarked about.

Beatrice Riley was a mystery. She
was one of those rare persons who never

talk about themselves. She had blos-
somed into a celebrity after a brief
round of bathing beauty contests. The
reporters, inquiring where she came
from, discovered that no one knew —
and the girl positively- refused to talk
about her past.

Before Bill met her he was skeptical
of the stories of her sensational diving.
Seme smart promoter must be hoaxing
the public, he thought. A man might
risk his life in a few of those dare-
devil dives— himself, for example. But
he was tops, or darned near it. But no
woman would dare — -

Then came the momentous sports
show that he and Bea Riley were asked
to appear in together. And that
changed everything. Bill Pierce saw
for himself.

Yes, and he came so near to being
outclassed that it wasn’t funny. Bea
Riley could have walked off with the
show. But she didn’t. She shared
honors with him.

That was the beginning of the team
of Pierce and Riley, headed straight for
international fame. For Bea was every-
thing the reporters had claimed and
more.

From the west coast they had flown
the Pacific to appear in expositions in
the Philippines and Australia. Now
they were sailing back to the States.
New York was already building them
up for a summer season appearance,
only three months away. . . .

J^EATRICE reread the radiogram
three or four times, then passed it
back to Bill without a word. She looked
out over the waters pensively.

“You see, Bea,” Bill said in the
hearty manner of a salesman with a bill
of goods to sell, “good old Vinson has
worked up some engagements for us
down in South America. You know
Vin — always looking out for us. He’s

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP

got business contacts down there, and
they’re pulling for us — ”

“Bill, you’re not considering going?”

“Well, it must be a good thing or he
wouldn’t suggest it. He’s going to meet
us at Honolulu and take us on to Argen-
tina in his big sea-going yacht.”

Bill saw the disapproval cloud
Beatrice’s face.

“Did you tell him we’d do it?” she
asked. ’

“Certainly not. I always talk these
things over with you.”

“And then you do what George Vin-
son wants you to.”

Bill’s hot temper wasn’t good for
moments like these, and knew it. He
saw red whenever his path was crossed.
And counting to ten didn’t help.

“Just remember something,” he
snapped. “Wait for me.”

He struck off around the deck. He
had to work off steam somehow. Maybe
by the time he came back Bea would be
reasonable.

But no, she was never reasonable
when George Vinson was concerned.
Bill couldn’t understand it. She was
such a swell, fair person to work with
in every other way.

Only six months ago Bill had intro-
duced Bea Riley to Vinson. And what
a feud he’d started! All the fine things
he’d ever said for his old friend had
been wasted. 'Bea Riley had shunned
George Vinson like poison.

Vinson had simply thrust his white-
gloved fingers through his mane of fine
black hair and walked away, ignoring
the insulting treatment.

“What in thunder went wrong be-
tween those two?” Bill had asked him-
self after that meeting of six months
ago. Then he had tried to apologize to
Vinson. Bea Riley, he said, musn’t be
misjudged for her seeming coolness.
She was a mystery to everyone.

Bill had also apologized to Bea for

his old friends manners. The im-
portant little man couldn’t help his ex-
treme dignity. His wealth, together
with his penchant for profound thought,
gave him an air of exaggerated im-
portance.

As for Vinson’s strange habit of al-
ways wearing white gloves, indoors as
well as out — well, he must possess
scarred and unsightly hands. That was
what Bill concluded. And after know-
ing him for six years Bill took the white
gloves to be as much a part of Vin as
his face or his pompadour of fine black
hair. . . .

Bill returned to Beatrice and she
looked up at him with a quick smile.

“What about it, Bea?” he said.

“Whatever you want to do, we’ll do,”
said Beatrice.

“Gee, honey,” he caught her in his
arms, kissed her. “You know me. What
I want is a honeymoon. In Canada, if
you say so.”

He looked at her steadily. Her eye-
lids lowered.

“Are you taking me to South Amer-
ica, Bill?” she asked.

“No. I’ll wire George Vinson it’s
off. From this minute on we’re inde-
pendent. How’s that?”

Beatrice searched his eyes. “I hope
you mean it, Bill.”

“I’ll send him a radiogram yet to-
night.”

“Think it over till morning,” said
Beatrice. “I want to be sure you don’t
change your mind . . . Let me know
at lunch . . .”

CHAPTER III

^"OW, near mid-afternoon of the day
that was to have brought Bill
Pierce and Beatrice Riley to a moment
of decision, the diving champion sat
before the desk of the captain, reciting

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

14 ,

his story of the previous evening.

“That’s about all,” Bill said in a low
voice. He touched his handkerchief to
the corners of his eyes.

“Thank you, Pierce,” said the cap-
tain.

“If that’s all, I’ll go,” said Bill. “I
want to talk with Windy Muff.”

The captain sat silently, frowning.,
“Pierce,” he said, “that girl was the
most remarkable swimmer and diver I
ever saw. I watched the slow motion
movie of her novel waterfall dive from
two hundred feet. I saw her start at
the top, dive down fifty feet to the first
elevated pool, shoot over the edge with
the cascade and down another fifty to
the second pool, and so on. Four suc-
cessive dives in one — all in the midst
of that roaring artificial waterfall.
When I think of that, Pierce, and the
long underwater swim she did — ”

Bill Pierce slapped his hand on the
table. “You’re seeing it my way now,
Captain. There’s a chance she’s not
drowned. She could fight water for
hours. How far off were those volcanic
islands when she went over?”

“About eight miles.”

“Let me go back, Captain. Give me
your launch. And a compass—”
“Could you keep on a course?”

“Let me take a sailor along. Windy
Muff. I’ll start at once.”

“You’re taking a big risk. How’ll
you get back?”

“I’ve got a friend in Honolulu —
George Vinson. He’s got a big yacht — ”
“Better send him a radiogram at
once,” said the captain. “If he puts
to sea this afternoon he should overtake
you by morning. I’ll round up Windy
Muff for you and check the log.” . „ .

r JpHERE was not a minute to lose.

Miles of waters were piling up for
the back-track cruise.

Bill shot his radiogram off to Vinson.

Meanwhile a note came to him from the
captain stating that Windy Muff was
seen entering Stateroom Number 90,
occupied by one Jean Maribeau.

Bill dashed down the corridor,
knocked at number 90. He was ad-
mitted by a sturdy immaculate little
man with a bristling black mustache
and a square jaw.

“Pardon me,” said Bill. “Is there a
sailor here by the name of — ”

“Ah, it is the famous Mr. Pierce. We
are honored.” Jean Maribeau might
have been greeting a long lost brother."'’
“Have a chair, Mr. Pierce. Mr. Muff
and I have something interesting—”

“I want a quick word with Windy
Muff,” Bill said bluntly. “I’m starting
back in a launch to try to find the girl
that fell overboard.”

The red-haired sailor looked up from
the desk where he had been preoccupied
with some pencil sketches. “Not a half
bad idea.”

“Has Mr. Pierce heard of your re-
markable observation, Mr. Muff?”
Maribeau asked.

“Uh-huh,” said Muff shrugging. “I
didn’t reckon he was interested.”

Bill Pierce was momentarily dis-
tracted by walls full of pictures. They
reminded him of the physiology charts
in a doctor’s office; diagrams of cir-
culatory systems, exposed muscles, skel-
etons. But the subjects were animals
rather than men. Odd, nameless an-
imals, as far as Bill could guess. Ob-
viously this Frenchman was a zoologist
and a man of learning.

“Mr. Muff has told me,” Maribeau
volunteered, touching the points of his
black mustache, “that he saw some
strange fish capture Miss Riley in a
sort of glass tub.”

“I’ve got no time to listen,” said Bill.
“I’m on my way back. Muff, do you
want to come?”

Windy Muff turned to Maribeau.

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP

“How about it, Doc?”

“I would give ten years of my life,”
said the scientist, “to possess one single
specimen of those unique sea creatures.
Could 1 go too, Mr. Pierce?”

CHAPTER IV

A FEW minutes later the three men
got into the twin-motored launch
and were lowered into the open sea.

While the liner plowed on toward
Hawaii, they roared away on the end-
less back-track course into the south-
western sun.

Windy Muff hejd the craft on a dead
line.

“Now, Maribeau,” said Bill, “what
were you saying about Windy’s fish
story?”

The scientist opened his packet of
books and papers.

“Would you like to see a sketch of
their footprints, Mr. Pierce?”

“I beg your pardon?” said Bill.

“Would you like to see the footprints
of the fish that got her?” Maribeau re-
peated. “I’ve made a drawing from
the marks that Mr. Muff and I discov-
ered on the side of the ship.”

“Footprints of a fish?” Bill stam-
mered.

“Fish isn’t the proper term, of
course,” said Maribeau. “Amphibian
would be more appropriate — or anuran
— though I must confess this creature
is difficult to classify, especially upon
the meager evidence of a few foot-
prints.”

Bill bent over the pencil sketch.

“Maribeau and I spotted it right be-
neath the rail where she went over,”
said Windy. “My gOllies, if this ain’t
one for Ripley.”

Bill gaped at the bold outline of a
webbed foot.

“Name it and you can have it,
Pierce,” said Windy Muff.

“I’d call it a mud splatter,” Bill
grunted, “though it might be taken for
the footprint of an oversized duck — or
better, a frog — ” ,

“Now you’re getting warm,” said
Maribeau, cocking his head. “As near
as I can place it, it’s a huge Surinam
toad, a species of water and mud crea-
tures found only in Dutch Guiana.
They’re quite rare, and strange to say
they have no tongues. But this fel-
low is no regular. He’s too large. And
too far from Guiana. And too much
at home in deep water.”

The sketch of the foot, Bill noted,
fairly filled the sheet of typing paper.

“He climbed the side of the ship,”
said Windy Muff with the air of having
witnessed it.

“With a rope, apparently,” the
scientist amended. “We found the mark
of a wet seaweed rope and a small hook
that he had used to pull himself up to
the deck where Miss Riley stood.”

“It don’t make sense, but Maribeau
claims he musta crawled up and lassoed
her, the slimy devil,” said Windy Muff.

“That’s our strange verdict,” said
Maribeau confidently. “And that argues
we’re on the trail of some monstrosity
with intelligence. I never saw anything
like it.”

Bill Pierce was frowning, trying to
digest these bizarre evidences.

“Maribeau,” he said sharply. “What
do you make of all this? Do you think
such creatures could actually imprison
a person with ropes and — and tubs?”
“I’ve no right to theorize on the
basis of these footprints,” said Mari-
beau, “but I’ll go as far as anyone to
find out. . . .”

T~^AWN found Bill and his two com-
panions nearing the area of the
volcanic islands. A clear night and a
glass-smooth ocean had facilitated their
backtracking excursion.

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

Now Windy Muff stood in the prow
sighting the low mountaintops. He
passed his field glasses to his compan-
ions.

“When those two peaks line up with
us,” he said, “well be right on a dead
shot for the spot where she went over.
Then it’ll be a matter of farther or
closer, the devil knows which.”

“Well have to pull closer,” said Bill.
“I remember seeing a bit of cliff along
the water-line.”

“And a heavy black line on the water
— at low tide,” Windy Muff added.
“Ain’t I right, Maribeau?”

The French scientist was lost in his
books. With the first gray of the morn-
ing he had resumed his ardent studies.

“Don’t bother him,” said Bill.

“It beats me,” said Windy Muff,
“how a scientist can take an animal’s
footprint and tell you what the darned
thing looks like.”

“Did his description agree with what
you saw?”

“The truth is,” said Windy Muff,
“about all I saw was some green blurs.
There wasn’t time — Ahoy! Look what’s
cornin’.”

Bill turned to see the speck of ship
on the northeastern horizon.

“That’s George Vinson, or I’m a
frog’s uncle!” Bill leaped up, stripped
off his shirt, began waving it. “Right
to us over the blue. He’s made speed
believe me.”

Maribeau was aroused by Bill’s ex-
cited talk, and in a moment he and
Windy Muff were following Bill’s ex-
ample, waving banners to the distant
yacht.

In less than an hour the trim white
craft nosed up within hailing distance
of the launch.

Bill looked up at the yacht’s prow
where the familiar figure of George
Vinson stood like a statue against the
sky. It was a curious fact, thought Bill,

that a man of George Vinson’s dimin-
utive stature somehow always gave the
impression of being a large powerful
person.

Part of it was Vinson’s masterful
manner. His superior air at this mo-
ment, for example, as he unfolded his
arms and raised both of them in a sign
of greeting, would have nettled Beatrice
Riley if she had been here.

As usual, Vinson was bareheaded,
and his long black hair blew like a
horse’s mane in the breeze. As usual,
he wore immaculate white from head
to foot, including white shoes and white
gloves.

“How does it go, my friend?” came
the hale greeting of George Vinson.

“Vin, are we ever glad to see you!”
Bill shouted.

“Come on up!”

JDILL caught the rope that one of
Vinson’s crew tossed out and tied
the launch up against the yacht’s gleam-
ing side. He climbed up, scrambling to
his feet. George Vinson’s hearty hand-
shake was waiting for him.

“It’s been many months,” said Vin-
son, smiling majestically. For minutes
the two men chatted warmly. Then
the smile went out of Vinson’s dark
gleaming eyes. “Tell me about this —
this unaccountable happening. Your
message was hard to believe. At first
I thought — well, never mind — ”

“What?”

“No offense, Bill,” said Vinson gaz-
ing across the waters reflectively, “but
my first thought was, Bill and Beatrice
are playing a practical joke on me, just
to bring me out to meet them. They’re
anxious to see me, so they’ve hatched
up this hoax — ”

“I only wish that were it, Vin,” said
Bill. “But nothing could be farther
from the truth.”

“Are you sure she didn’t just strike

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP

out and swim to yonder island?”
George Vinson suggested.

“Hell, no, Vin! You’re all wet,”
Bill snapped. This confident calmness
of Vin’s could be annoying. It was
a trait that tended to give the older
man a mastery of any situation. It
made Bill feel like a hot-headed youth.
“Let me explain. She didn’t swim
away.”

“No?” Vinson passed a white glove
over his fine flowing black hair.

“She was pulled overboard— there
was a rope — and some sort of green sea
creature—”

George Vinson’s gloved hand froze
on the back of his neck. He stared at
Bill, then his mystical eyes peered into
the sea. The white slits of scars on
either side of his neck reddened. IjCe
turned sharply to his sailors.

“Bring out the diving suits.”

While Bill and one of Vin’s sailors
changed into the diving outfits, there
was a general recounting of all details
of Bea’s strange departure. Windy
Muff and Maribeau climbed aboard
the yacht to add their share of the ac-
count. Maribeau sketched a webbed
foot. Windy stuck to his story that the
creatures were green blurs kicking
through the water.

And all the while George Vinson
stood with hands on hips and head high,
like something carved of granite.

“We're a full ten miles from the
islands,” he said finally. “We’ll scout
along a trifle closer. Everyone keep a
sharp watch on the waters close about.”

T)ILL climbed back into the launch,
and Windy and the scientist fol-
lowed. They swung the launch around
to follow in the wake of the yacht. They
could see the Napoleon-like figure of
Vinson measuring his steps along the
deck, and Bill pulled up within voice
range. But the only interchange of

conversation was a warning from Vin-
son to keep the diving helmet ready
and keep a sharp lookout. Then —

“Look out!” '“Watch it, there!”
George Vinson and a sailor both shouted
at once.

Bill whirled in time to see it happen.
A loop of lithe seaweed rope spun out
of the water’s surface within ten feet
of the launch. The loop fell over the
head and shoulders of the scientist.
The rope tightened with a jerk.

For a split second Maribeau was al-
most overboard and gone. The rope
went taut like an irresistible steel cable
and started off with him.

But the scientist’s hands and knees
hooked the side of the launch, and in
the same instant Bill dived to catch his
feet. The rope snapped off an arms
length beyond the edge of the boat.

Maribeau shrank back, muttering
profanity in a foreign tongue. He
jerked the tightly corded seaweed off
his shoulders, flung it to the bottom
of the boat, wiped his slime-covered
hands on a handkerchief.

“I saw the critters,” Bill gasped.
“Just as you caught yourself and the
rope went tight.”

Maribeau ’s white face nodded. He
had evidently seen them too, but just
now he was too scared to say so.

“I seen three,” said Windy Muff.
“But there musta been more, the way
they was pullin’. And if that rope
hadn’t broke — ” Windy stopped to
scratch his head. “What the devil were
those things? They had arms like mon-
keys, and prickly spines like big lizards

“I’d give ten years of my life,” Mari-
beau uttered in a scared whisper, “for
just one specimen.”

“Wonder what they’d pay for one
of us,” Windy grunted.

Bill closed the diving helmet down
over his shoulders and all talk dimmed

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

and melted together like tunnel sounds.
The air-tight suit was a flimsy affair,
unsuitable for extreme depths, and the
oxygen supply was meager. But Bill
was eager for a look under the surface.

Bill waved a signal to Vinson that
he was ready to go over. But again
Vinson was shouting something.

Then the sound of a heavy splash
seeped into the bell-jar head-piece, Bill
turned, saw the agonized fright in Mari-
beau’s face. Windy Muff was gone!

Or rather, he was going. A seaweed
rope was dragging him down. Bill
hastily checked the fastenings of his
air-tight suit and dived.

The force of gravity was with him on
his first plunge for depth. He cut down
through the water with a powerful
stroke. The retreating figure of Windy
Muff was a shadowy blur straight ahead
of him. Those two fleeting spots of light
were Windy’s bare feet.

And Bill was almost on them. If the
fellow would just stop his senseless
kicking —

pOR an instant Bill had the sailor

by the toe. But the green creatures
must have felt the tug. They suddenly
jerked Windy Muff away with frantic
speed. Bill couldn’t match it — not in
a bulky diving suit. The shadowy forms
pulled out of his reach and were gone.

That would be the last of Windy
Muff, thought Bill. By this time the
poor fellow must have taken in a lung-
full of water. Bill started to climb.

But at that moment he caught sight
of a dim yellow circle of light some-
where farther beyond — and below. He
plowed toward it. It had all the look
of an artificial light. This was incred-
ible.

He was down deep now. In spite of
the inflated suit, the water crushed hard
against his sides. Gravity was against
him, too, and he had to fight water to

keep from being buoyed up.

The circle of yellow was expanding
into half a globe that streaked the
waters with zig-zagging spangles. There
was activity somewhere in that vicinity
Now the shreds of light were half
clouded with a shower of white sand.
So this was near the bottom. They
must be imprisoning Windy in one of
those transparent tubs. But it was all
too black for Bill to see. He crept
closer.

By this time the dome of light was
on a level higher than his eyes. Sud-
denly he saw the sharp-toothed outlines
of a green sea creature, then a second,
and a third. They were passing like
sentinels around the top of what ap-
peared to be a cylindrical tank. Its
vertical walls were solid black, but the
light that fountained out of the trans-
parent top gave it form.

A quick movement from one of the
green sea creatures warned Bill. They
were on the alert. One of them crossed
over the light and he caught a perfect
picture of it. Its beady little magenta-
ringed eyes were darting about, on
sharp watch for trouble. The spines
over its back were bristling.

What effect, he wondered, would
those spines have on a flimsy diving
suit like his? Those were fighting
spines. A row of them armored the
back of each leg, too. They were like
elonyated fins, or they might have been
rows of thin knife -blades connected by
webs. K

It was hard to tell, under the distort-
ing water, how large these creatures
were. But Bill’s best guess was that
they were three or four feet long. He
was certainly not prepared for an en-
counter with one of them, much less a
band that knew how to work together.

He shrank back. His oxygen would
soon be gone. If he could retreat un-
discovered, enough would be accom-

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP

plished for the moment. For by this
time, he knew, Windy Muff was either
drowned or else imprisoned in an up-
right tank of compressed air. That
left Bill free to follow either of two lines
of action.

He could swim back to the yacht
for a rope to attach to this undersea
cylinder. All hands on deck might be
able to lift it, and Windy Muff with it.

Or Bill could come back with a fresh
supply of oxygen and wait to see what
the creatures might do with their pris-
oner. That would be his cue as to what
had happened to Bea.

One of the other of these plans — but
he had better have, a quick talk with
George Vinson first. He started up.

Then as his eyes came on a level
with the dome of light he caught sight
of the prisoner. It was not Windy
Muff. It was Beatrice Riley.

CHAPTER V

/"\N THE instant all of Bill’s neatly
^ built plans toppled into confusion.
The waters about him became a chaos
of flashing prisms as he automatically
fought to stop his upward climb.

The light must have flooded over his #
helmeted face, for now Bea was looking
up at him. There was a flick of smile
with her recognition, cut short by an
expression of shock.

Under less perilous circumstances
Bill would have interpreted that
shocked look as embarrassment. Bea
could have been no less scantily clothed
if she had been in her diving costume.
Obviously her fight against being cap-
tured had cost her her outer garments.

But her shock was plainly one of
fear. Her lips were uttering anguished
warnings.

“Bill! Be careful!”

In a glance Bill saw five or six of the
green sea creatures were drawing back

into a group. Their beady little eyes
were staring at him. The bright red
lines around their mouths seemed to
draw tight, as if in cynical smiles. They
were hovering in readiness to attack.

Bill’s glance flashed back at Bea.
She was trying to shake her head at him.
But her actions were obstructed by in-
struments which Bill had hardly noticed
at first. They appeared to be two large
electrodes, one fastened to each side of
her head.

There was no time to wonder what
all of this strange paraphernalia might
mean. Already the sea creatures were
coming toward him.

They bounced over the light in V
formation — five of them. Their necks
bowed like the necks of chariot horses.
In fact, there was a strange resemblance
between their heads and the heads of
horses. Their monkey-like arms pawed
the water, they reared their spiny backs
and plowed straight for Bill’s midsec-
tion.

Bill flung himself in a quick somer-
sault. The heavy transparent headgear
was the least vulnerable part of his
costume. He was barely quick enough
to take the blow of their attack on his
head. Their spines clicked past like
a course-toothed saw scraping his div-
ing helmet.

His instincts told him to descend.
There was darkness below. The light
from overhead would play an advantage
to whoever was nearest the bottom.

The green water-horses were right
after him. He kicked a spray of white
sand at them, then made a hard curved
plunge around the base of the upright
cylinder.

But they were in their element, swish-
ing through these dark waters. At once
they were coming at him from both di-
rections. With savage fury they shot
over his arms shearing the sleeves of
his diving suit. The waters beat in

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

upon his arms like sledge-hammers.

Back the green devils came from all
directions. Their spines were steel
sharp. He felt one long sweep of saw-
tooth points rip the full length of his
spine.

That was the last of his diving suit.
Its protection was gone. Only the shreds
of it clung to his wrists and feet. He
kicked out of it.

The pressure flung water up into his
face like a blast from a fire hose, and
then his helmet bounded off. He was
at the mercy of the deep. His ear-
drums were near to bursting.

J_TE WAS holding half a breath. But

A it would never last him till he
climbed to the surface. He was too
nearly done in with exhaustion. The
pain from the gashes and scrapings of
spines was like fire. He was losing
blood. A faintness was sweeping in on
him.

Bill tensed his muscles into steel
armor to fight the crushing weight of
water. Could he chance the climb to
the surface?

The five'Savage horse-faced creatures
were obviously waiting for him to come
up into the light again. To rip his body
wide open? He could make out their
distorted silhouettes at the upper edge
of the lighted dome. Their lithe arms
were paddling restlessly. They seemed
about to plunge again — four of them.
But the fifth. . . .

Bill was uncertain whether to trust
his eyes. The fifth of the creatures —
the large one with yellow Z-shaped
streaks on each side of its green sides —
seemed to be holding the other four
back. A few bold waggles of the crea-
ture’s head caused the other four to slide
back into the darkness. The last Bill
could see of them they were swimming
away. '

Bill’s lungs were near to bursting.

He saw a leap of the big “Yellow-Z”
toward the upper edge of the cylinder.

At once a square of light appeared
at Bill’s feet. It was a welcome sight —
a door at the base of the cylinder. It
had slid open, inviting him. Inside
there would be compressed air.

Bill would have entered if the place
had been a fiery furnace.

He plowed through the foot-square
aperture, rose through a series of valves
that drew him up automatically. Sud-
denly the hammering water was gone.
Air struck his face.

Air! His breathless gasp resounded
in the cylinder like the intake of a gas
engine. Air!

A floor pushed up solid and dry
against his feet. Now he could feel the
sting of air against his gashed arms
and the stripe along his back. It was
a welcome sensation, in spite of the
light trickles of blood.

Blackness was sweeping in on him.
He was vaguely aware that he was
groping at the smooth panelled cylinder
walls, that Bea Riley was beside him,
that her arms were supporting him.

But the mad exertion had cost him
his consciousness. His fainty head
lopped against Bea’s side, and every-
thing went black.

CHAPTER VI

T)ILL scraped his wrists across his
face and rubbed an eye open.
Colors swam before him in a bleary
fog.

He took a long breath. His lips were
dry and swollen. He dimly realized
he’d been thirsting for more oxygen.
The air was stifling. He was still in the
big upright cylinder with Beatrice.

Such nightmares! He’d dreamed he
was inside an iron lung that had shrunk
into a silvered radio tube, Bea was there
too, trying to keep him from falling.

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP

The dream made her a part of the
electrical instrument. Spasms of elec-
tricity had been shocking her, so the
dream went, until finally her arms had
weakened and dropped him. He’d fal-
len to the floor of the tube, lain there.
His blood had seeped away. And Bea
was powerless to help him. She was
only a part of the radio tube.

The misery of the dream came back
to him. as he lay coiled on the floor of
the tube. But the dream was partly
true, he knew.

His back was no longer bleeding,
however, and he knew that the scraping
he had suffered from the sea creature’s
fins had not hurt him seriously.

His elbow was pressing against Bea-
trice’s feet. It was a comfort to know
she was still there, though she looked
very pale and tired.

Again Bill slipped off into troubled
sleep, and the same weird nightmare
went round and round.

Then a sudden jolting and rocking
of his prison floor brought him back
to consciousness. The dream vanished.
Bea was still there, with the electrical
instruments fastened to the sides of her
head.

A panic of terror struck Bill anew.
What were those strange electrical in-
struments? What were they doing to
her?

Her eyes were closed. In the ghastly
yellow glow she looked deathly.

“Bea! What’s happening?” Bill
whispered.

Her eyes opened, she reached a hand
down to him, helped him to his feet.

“I’m all right, Bill,” she said. “Just
dozing.”

“They’re not electrocuting you or
anything?”

“Hardly.” Beatrice gave him a mys-
terious little smile.

“I was a sap to faint away,” Bill
muttered. “We must be nearly out of

oxygen. We’ve got to get out of there
before, it’s too late.”

The uprights cylinder gave another
lurch. Bill’s weight struck the wall and
the cylinder tottered precariously.
“Where the hell are they taking us?”
“We’d better get down,” said Bea.
“We’re so top-heavy we almost
crashed.”

“That’d be all right with me — if we
could climb past those devilish things

“Horse-fish,” said Bea.

. “Whatever you want to call them,”
Bill growled. He went down stiffly on
his knees. The cylinder coasted along
a little more smoothly. And when
Beatrice succeded in unfastening the
electrical instruments so she could
crouch closer to the floor, the strange
undersea prison rolled along as steadily
as something on rubber tires.

“We’re learning,” said Beatrice. “It’s
better to cooperate with them.”

“Cooperate!” Bill barked. “The
thing for us to do is get out.”

“They’d pounce on us again, Bill,
just like before. They’re smart.”

T) ILL searched her eyes. Her tone of
voice had carried a strong hint of
respect for what she had called the
“horse-fish.” Did she know anything
about these wily creatures?

“We’ve got to make a break,” Bill
snapped, rising again with hands braced
against the walls. “Get your breath.
Let’s take our chances — ”

“Against the open sea, Bill?”
“There’s a yacht up above. He’s
waiting for us.”

“Not Vinson?” Bea cried.

His affirmative nod terrorized her.
She sprang up and clutched his arms.
Then the vertical walls swayed and fell.

The water valves groaned and one
of them sprang slightly open. A flat
blade of water dashed in.

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

“Come on, Beal ” Bill gasped, scram-
bling to his hands and knees — for the
lurch of the tank had thrown the two
of them into a heap. “Now’s our
chance. We’re trapped here unless — ”
“No, Bill—”

“Don’t be afraid. What’s the mat-
ter?”

“Does Vinson know I’m down here?”
“Why?”

“Does he?” Beatrice was almost
screaming.

“He knows the horse-fish pulled you
off the ship. He’s got to know we’re
still alive. He has some divers — ”
“Look!” Beatrice breathed with re-
lief. “They’re setting us upright.
We’re still safe here.”

“I tell you we’re getting out of here! ”
Bill snapped hotly.

“Go back to Vinson if you want to,”
she said in a chill voice. “But don’t
tell him I’m here, I’d rather die.”
“Bea!”

It was all that Bill could manage
to say at the moment. He let his head
fall back against the wall. This was
more than he could fathom. How could
she hold such an abhorence for George
Vinson? Even now in the face of death
her mysterious single hatred over-
shadowed everything else.

Now the righted tank was again rid-
ing along the sandy sea bottom taking
them to some unknown destination.

“Bea,” Bill pleaded, “can’t you tell
me what it is?”

She nodded slowly, looked into Bill’s
eyes with confidence.

“You’ve always said Vinson was a
right fellow, Bill. You’ve called him
good — and sincere — and honest — ”
“Well?”*

“He is,” she said quietly. “He’s all
those things and more. I knew him be-
fore you did”

“Bea!”

“He’s true blue, Bill. That’s why I

can’t face him. Vm not l”

“W5“L are you talking about?”
Bill swept his hand across his
forehead dizzily. “You’re true blue,
honey. I’d swear it. Hell, what’s this
all about? It doesn’t make sense.”

“Don’t try to understand, Bill. Just
listen to me. I’m not crazy. I know
this part of the sea. I even know what
these horse-fish are up to. It was just
a chance that they took me off the boat
instead of someone else. I was horri-
fied when it happened, naturally — on
your account. But I can take my
chances — ”

“You’re talking wild — ”

The Valves slid open and a gust of
pure fresh air filled the cylinder.

“There’s no time to tell you more,”
Beatrice whispered. “Take my word
for it. If you love me, Bill, don’t ask
questions now — ”

“Do I take you back with me or don’t
I?”

“You — if you can — but not Vinl”

Bill was breathing heavily. He was
scarcely aware that the cylinder was
gliding along with a low grinding noise
like a metal cart over sands. He only
knew he was breathing air again, his
mind was clearing, he was thinking
fast. And his fighting spirit was about
to bound out of hand.

“So you’ve known Vin before.” Bill
could feel his cheeks redden. “Has he
been in love with you? ... Is he
now?”

Beatrice glanced sharply toward the
cylinder floor as the valves clanked. She
whispered, “They’re coming after you.”

“If I had a knife I’d slit their bellies,”
he hissed.

“No l” There was more than terror
in her whisper. “We’re at their mercy
— both of us. Watch them, Bill . . .
Study them ”

“While they rip my back to shreds?”

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP

“When the time is right I’ll send you
word. Until then — Wait! That’s all
I can tell you.”

Through the wide-open valves Bill
saw the horse-fish beckoning him to
come. Only his faith in Beatrice made
him obey.

The last of the rectangular doors
closed behind him. He was outside the
cylinder, breathing the free air of an
immense cavern. And in the half-light
that sifted down from a lofty ceiling
and towering rock walls he glimpsed the
strangest city he had ever seen.

CHAPTER VII

'T'HERE was so much movement close
about him that he had no time to
take in the details of this immense un-
derground world.

He glanced back at the cylinder from
which he had just emerged. The twen-
ty-eight or thirty horse-fish surrounding
it paid no attention to him. They evi-
dently meant to keep Beatrice im-
prisoned, for she had not emerged. Now
they were pressing levers to lock the
valves.

Their cunning hands grappled with
the ropes hooked to its sides. It rolled
back down the wet tracks with a crunch-
ing of metal wheels over wet gravel.
Bill drew back out of the way, watched
the big instrument move along, sil-
houetted against the wide cobweb of
artificial lights on the nearest wall.

The horse-fish worked together bet-
ter than any team of circus animals.
They worked with intelligence. Every
horse-fish knew what he was about.
Together they pulled the upright “iron-
lung” down the roadway into the water.

This was the path by which it had
come in from the sea. The tracks proved
that. So did Bill’s sharp sense of direc-
tion. That big circular steel door half
under water must be one of a series of

locks that shut out the sea.

For Bill knew that this place was be-
low sea level. He had never ascended,
since his dive; moreover the very air
pressure on his eardrums argued that
this cavern floor was deep.

Beatrice, still imprisoned, was quick-
ly carted away. As she was passing
through the circular opening a gush of
imprisoned sea water rushed into the
narrow channel, sloshing past the cylin-
der’s transparent dome.

Bea looked back to Bill. The intent
expression, the slight shake of the head,
seemed to say, “Don’t forget!”

Then in his final glimpse of her Bill
saw that two horse-fish had climbed up
into the cylinder to replace the electrical
clamps on her head.

Now she was gone. The swarm of
horse-fish kicking along at the sides of
the cylinder passed into darkness. The
circular steel door closed.

“Well, I’ll be damned,” Bill said
aloud.

“It’s got me goin’ too, pal,” said a
voice back of him. It was Windy Muff,
sauntering up and planting a lazy elbow
on Bill’s shoulder.

“I can’t figure — ” Bill stopped with
a gulp. “Windy! Where the dickens
did you come from?”

“I went to sea in a tub,” said Windy
with a dry cackle. “They just now took
me out of one of those undersea go-carts
— only they had to pull me out with
ropes.”

“I thought you’d be drowned — ”

“They pumped life into me — then
scared it outa me again. I can’t look
’em in the face without turnin’ ten
shades of white.”

“TX/INDY, I’m darned glad you’re
alive!” Bill smiled grimly.
“But you know you’ve fallen into a
devil of a mess down here.”

“It’d be a heap easier on the nerves

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

to be dead. Was that the gal?”

Bill nodded. “Looks like they’re
taking her back to sea. This strip of
water is the slippery slide to the outside
world, if my directions are straight.”
The dark waters surged at the chan-
nel walls and proceeded to drain away
through the circular door. Somewhere
pumps were working.

“I think you’re right,” said Windy.
“That’s the way we came through.”
“We?” '

“The critters got in my go-cart with
me to shake the water out of my lungs,”
Windy explained. “Then they crawled
out again to help pull me through the
locks. There was a spell of blackness,
and when it lifted I was here”

“Here!” Bill echoed glumly. He
gazed around. “My great guns, what a
cave! A whole underground city.”
“Ain’t it!” Windy Muff sounded a
forlorn note. “If I ever get back to
tell about this, they’ll never believe
me.”

“Don’t worry about ever getting
back,” said Bill, nudging his com-
panion. ,

Several horse-fish were watching the
two of them from the not-too- friendly
distance of fifteen or twenty yards.

As a matter of fact, the creatures
appeared to be listening — though Bill
had no way of knowing whether this
were possible.

One of the six or eight more atten-
tive horse-fish had a familiar look. His
green sides were marked with yellow
zig-zag stripes resembling the letter Z.

“That fellow,” Bill whispered to
Windy, “came near to ripping my back-
bone out. We clashed somewhere out
there beyond the wall.”

“They’ve got damned dangerous
looking spines,” Windy muttered.
“Hell,, he did tear up your back a bit,
fellow. You oughta unroll a yard of
tape and pull vourself together. Feel

bad?”

“Not now,” said Bill. “Seems like
it clotted and began healing as soon as
I got out of the water. Strange . . .
Look, they’re gathering in on us.”

Like so many loafers and stragglers
stopping at a street corner to look at a
pair of out-of-town elephants, the horse-
fish came closer. From numerous
ponds and rivulets and branching caves
of the immediate neighborhood they
came. Some seemed reluctant to leave
the water, perhaps because of inertia.
They were obviously adapted to land.
Once out of water they came striding
on their hind legs.

Some came timidly, like so many
bashful schoolgirls. Some strutted, like
wise old frogs out of a fairy legend,
weighted down with burdens of too
much knowledge. Some tossed their
horse-fish heads high in an attitude of
snobbery and sauntered along with
their webbed hands on their trim green
hips.

But the most business-like specimens
marched up boldly, twirling their lithe
seaweed ropes.

■npHESE brisk marchers were crea-
A tures of responsibility, there was no
doubt about that. Bill thought he de-
tected a superior sharpness in their
glassy spines.

“We’re in for it,” Muff whispered,
turning ten shades of white.

“Don’t start anything, Windy,” Bill
mumbled. “I’ve had a tip”

“Hasn’t she got you in enough
trouble?”

“S-s-sh. They’re listening . . . That
‘Yellow-Z’ is watching me like a hawk.”

Two of the horse-fish advanced bold-
ly, placed slipknotted ropes around the
wrists of each man, led them across the
wet gravel beach. Bill thought it best
to humor them. He offered no resist-
ance.

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP

“See all that pinkish light way up
yonder?” Windy whispered as they
plodded along.

“What about it?” Bill asked guarded-
ly.

“Could be daylight,” said Windy.
“If we’d jerk loose and make a run for
it — ”

“That’s a good two miles away,”
said Bill, “and we don’t know these
underground paths. If these horse-fish
can run like they can swim we wouldn’t
get far.”

“They’re built to swim like fish,”
Windy whispered.

“And run like horses. Take it easy,
Windy.”

“Easy! Ugh I” Windy became less
guarded in his talk. “My instinct says
fight. Tear into ’em with rocks — ”

A sharp jerk of the rope on Windy’s
wrist silenced him. He rolled his eyes
toward Bill and whispered cautiously,
“Did you see that?”

Bill nodded. “They heard you — and
understood, by George.”

“It’s uncanny. I don’t believe it. It
just happened. I’ll prove it.” Windy
ceased his whispering and said in a
normal voice. “Bill, in about a minute
I’m gonna slice the hearts out of a
couple of these green-bellied — ”

Jerk! The rope pulled so sharply it
snapped. For a moment Windy ; had
the wild eye of a bull calf that breaks
out of its halter.

Windy might have had a hot inspira-
tion to take flight, but Bill saw the
notion cool. The way the spines sud-
denly bristled over those horse-fish was
enough to make anyone think twice.
Windy stood calmly while his guardian
horse-fish slipped another loop over his
wrist, and the party moved on.

“Now what do you say?” Bill whis-
pered.

“Nothing out loud,” Windy retorted.
“Devilishly odd, though . . . They

musta been disturbed by my tone of
voice. They didn’t understand the
words, do you reckon?”

Bill started to answer, but he saw
the eyes of one of his captors roll h.t him
curiously. They were listening. Bill
was sure of it.

“If they hear, it’s damned funny they
don’t talk,” Windy said under his
breath. “I haven’t heard a squeak out
of any of ’em.”

“I’ll swear I heard some voices in the
distance when they first brought me out
into the cavern.”

“What kind of voices, Bill? Frog
croaks — or horse whinneys?”

“Sort of human voices, I thought,”
said Bill, trying to recapture the fleet-
ing impressions of a few minutes before.
“Hard to tell, though, with all the echoes
floating around through these caverns.”

'T'TIE party followed a crooked trail
along the natural irock wall. They
came to a stop at a circular steel door
with a white X painted across it.

Two horse-fish opened the door and
silently motioned Bill and Windy in.
It was a cavern chamber. Low artifi-
cial lights were burning. Bill walked
in, Windy followed, and the door closed
after them.

The room was unoccupied, and that
fact was enough to make it inviting.
Bill dropped down on the sand floor and
sighed, “Home. Don’t wake me till
breakfast.”

“Jail,” said Windy. “Don’t wake me
till the execution ... At least we
won’t have to face those damnable
green devils as long as this lasts.”

“No?” said Bill. “Take a look at
our ocean view.”

The room was partly natural cavern
formations, partly artificial walls. But
across to the right there was a large
glass window. Choppy little waves of
gray-green water sloshed against the

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

lower half of it. No skies or horizons
were visible. This patch of sea was
imprisoned within what appeared to be
an endless adjoining cavern. Only the
plate glass kept it from pouring into
Bill’s and Windy’s rocky cell.

A horse-fish was padding gently along
the surface of the water — Yellow Z. He
came up to the window, pressed his nose
against it.

Windy Muff took one look and burst
into profanity. He’d never eat or sleep,
he declared, if those blinkety-blank crit-
ters kept staring at him.

“As long as you haven’t any bed or
food,” Bill chuckled, “you’re not losing
anything.” He rose, sauntered over to
the window, gazed out at Yellow-Z.
“The fellow’s as friendly as a pet dog.”

“Yeah?” Windy snorted. “Well, get
him to lead us outa here . . . Ain’t he
the same one that sliced you down the
back?”

“Right . . . And then protected me
from another attack. I can’t understand
it.”

“Sounds screwy, but if you say —
Bill! Look at these foot tracks!”

Windy pointed to a confusion of
marks in the sand. Bill bent over them.
They were human foot tracks. The
chamber floor was full of them.

“So we aren’t the first to drop into
this,” Bill muttered. “They’re old
tracks, though. Maybe years old.”

“Maybe we’ll be old before we get
out,” Windy rejoined.

Nothing more was said for some time.
Bill explored the cavern chamber. His
thoughts were in a whirl. Undoubtedly
all these mysteries had their meanings.
Here in one corner, for instance, was
one of those miniature street lights — a
pink globe mounted on a pair of ebony
legs. He had noticed several such lights
on his way to this jail. The under-
ground city he had glimpsed had been
dotted with them.

Pink street lights that stood not more
than four feet high ... A window
opening into another vast cavern half-
filled with sea . . . Human foot tracks
all over this prison floor . . . And
somewhere out in the deep waters Bea-
trice Riley encased in a metal cylinder
with an electrical apparatus clamped to
her head . . . And all through the cav-
erns and out in the sea, myriads of
horse-fish — strange hybrid creatures
that worked like men — and listened to
men’s talk — but never spoke.

What could it all mean?

JgILL paced until he was dripping
with perspiration. His confusions
only 'deepened. Windy Muff had fallen
asleep by this time, and somehow that
seemed the sensible thing to do.

In one of the natural rock alcoves
Bill found a spring of fresh water. He
drank his fill, bathed himself. He
spliced the scanty shreds of diving suit
that clung to his body, managed to con-
vert the torn strips into fairly comfort-
able trunks. The air was so warm that
he felt no need for any more clothing.

Then he nestled down in a bed of fine
sand and treated himself to a sleep.

A clank of the chamber door awak-
ened him. He sprang up with a start.
His dreams had been beset by dangers,
and this sudden intrusion found him
alert for an attack.

“Windy, they’re coming in! Wake — ”
But Windy was no longer sleeping.
Bill’s glance swept the room to catch the
sailor calmly kneeling beside the ebony
legs of the pink light globe. He turned
to Bill with a confident wink.

“They’re bringing us dinner,” said
Windy. “Needn’t get excited.”
“Dinner? How do you know?”

The circular door had opened and
now four horse-fish marched in, each
bearing a corner of a tray of food. They
set the tray down on a flat shelf of rock,

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP

turned and went out. In a moment the
circular door clanked closed.

Windy Muff sauntered over to the
tray, picked up a nicely browned fish
and began to eat.

Bill simply glared. “Well, I’ll be
damned. Are you in cahoots with this
gang of green bellied monsters too?. . .
or have they hypnotized you? . . .
Don’t eat it, you fool. You’ll be poi-
soned.”

Windy Muff grinned and went on
munching. “Tastes good to me. Bet-
ter try some.”

Bill looked across to the window.
Yellow Z was still loafing out there in
the water, his red ringed eyes keeping
watch.

“You said you wouldn’t eat as long as
the critters watched you,” Bill mocked.
“Look at Yellow Z. He’s got the same
stupid grin on his face that you’ve got.

“Maybe he’s had a good dinner too,”
said Windy. “Join me?”

“No,” said Bill. “I’m too smart to
take poison.”

Then he caught a second whiff of the
delicious fried fish. He edged closer,
nibbled a sample. It was irresistible.
He sat down beside the tray and ate
like a horse.

Windy leaned back against a rock,
locking his freckled fingers back of his
head for a pillow.

“I’ve discovered something, Bill.
Kinda made me feel different toward
these beasts.”

“Well?”

“Remember what Maribeau said
about those foot tracks? They looked
like overgrown Surinam toads — ”

“But this was the wrong ocean for
animals from Dutch Guiana—”

“Remember he mentioned that those
toads don’t have any tongues? . . .
Well, maybe these critters don’t have
much in common with the specimens
he was talking about, except for their

webbed feet and their spiny backs. But
I’ve got it figured out that they also
don’t have tongues.”

“Because they don’t talk? said Bill
skeptically.

“Because they do talk in a different
way”

wn rose and walked over to
the pink light globe. He knelt
beside it, thrust his head between the
two ebony posts so that one of his ears
rested against each.

“Come try this, Bill, if you ain’t
afraid of gettin’ electrocuted.”

Windy drew back to watch Bill with
glowing eyes.

The ebony posts were cool against
Bill’s cheekbones as he wedged his head
between them. Whatever the material
was, it had enough elasticity to fit
snugly against his ears. He listened.
At first he heard nothing. Then, a weird
flow of communication . . . thought-
waves

“Have you finished dinner yet? . . .
We’ll come for the tray as soon as
you’re through . . . You’re prisoners
. . . Don’t try to get out . . . We can
be severe if necessary . .

The challenge sent a flare of hot tem-
per through Bill’s swimming brain.

“. . . No use to fly off the handle
. . . That won’t get you anywhere . . .
You wouldn’t be the first upper-world
man we’ve ripped to shreds ... We
turn loose on upper-world men as quick
as we do on spiny-men ... So my
words have you guessing, have they?
. . . You haven’t heard of spiny-men?
. . . Take a look across the river to the
other city . . . But don’t get too many
ideas about exploring around . . .
You’re staying right here as long as we
need you . . .”

Bill jerked his head out of the weird
telephone. He was breathing hard, his
fingers were quivering.

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

“Didja hear voices?” Windy asked
eagerly.

Bill nodded uncertainly. “I got a
message, all right — a long, rambling
one. But I didn’t hear a thing.”

“Different, ain’t it?” Windy’s grin
froze in an expression of puzzlement.
“The first time I listened in I wanted
to tear those poles out by the roots and
beat myself over the head. I thought
I was goin’ nuts, hearin’ things that
couldn't be heard. Then I thought how
godawful hungry I was, and they picked
it up.”

“How’d you happen to try in the first
place?”

“Saw some horse-fish doin’ it. Back
along our inside wall I found a little
barred window that gives a squint of
the city. Or rather, both cities — one in
each side of the cavern.”

“My message,” said Bill, “mentioned
the other city. And there was a lot of
talk about spiny-men. What the devil
are they?”

“Never heard of them,” Windy said
in denial.

“The uncanny thing, though,” said
Bill, eyeing the pink light globe sus-
piciously, “was the way that voice —
only it wasn’t a voice — kept answering
me. The instant I thought a question,
it answered.”

Windy waved his hands helplessly.
“Don’t be askin’ me how.”

Bill began pacing again.

Windy chuckled mirthlessly. “Now
I know what made the foottracks all
over this place. Whoever was penned
up in this joint last went nuts tryin’ to
dope out that noiseless phone.”

“Listen, Windy,” said Bill sharply.
“You watched me while I was getting
that message a moment dgo. Did I
ever talk any — out loud, I mean?”

“Not a word,” said Windy.

“Then how the devil could that horse-
fish chop me off with an answer every

time I thought a question?”

“And how could he talk back to you
without a tongue?” Windy shrugged.
“Didn’t I tell you they’ve got a different
way of talkin’? This is it. Come back
to the barred window and you can see
’em headin’ into phone booths all over
town.”

T)UT at that instant a flash of green

9 outside the big glass window
stopped bill in his tracks. Yellow Z had
suddenly fled the waters.

“Musta forgot an appointment,”
Windy cracked.

Then came wild splashing over the
water’s surface. It was a chase. A
bronze body swam past so close that
his elbow bumped the plate glass. Bill
caught sight of the coarse-featured mas-
culine face. The man shot on, swim-
ming fast.

Close on his heels came five horse-
fish. Their little red-lined faces were
blazing with fury. Their red slits of
gills were working hard. Their steely
spines bristled with readiness to slice
flesh and bones.

Water splashed to the top of the win-
dow, blurred Bill’s vision. As the glass
cleared he saw the chase turn into a
deadly fight.

The bronzed man whirled with the
alacrity of a fish, his long black hair
slapped over his shoulder, his wide flat
hands jerked a short thin knife out of
his belt. His back lurched up out of
the water just before he struck.

In that instant Bill caught sight of
the row of sharp points — a dozen or
more of them — that lined the fellow’s
back bone.

“If we could bust that window,”
Windy yelled, “we might save that
man’s life.”

“No.” Bill’s jaw was set hard. “It’s
their battle. Besides, he’s not a man.
He’s a spiny-man.”

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP

CHAPTER VIII

“^XZHATEVER he is,” Windy
gasped, “he’s committin’ suicide,
swimmin’ in amongst those damned
green-bellied rippers.”

“Maybe so. I don’t know — ” Bill’s
unconscious words gave way to breath-
less silence. He and Windy both
pressed their faces against the plate
glass.

That knife in the webbed fingers of
the spiny-man was cutting arcs into the
water like a windmill wheel with one
blade. A splash of red leaped up from
the waves. One of the horse-fish plowed
off from the rest of the party, kicking
around in a circle of its own, dragging a
black mass of spilling entrails behind it.

Then, ceasing to kick, the knifed
horse-fish hung limply in the waves,
only five or six feet beyond the window.
The waters around it grew discolored,
and the red shroud hid it from view.

“Goodbye, spiny-man! ” Windy
barked, pointing back to the fight.

Bill saw. The largest of the attack-
ing horse-fish — a creature with a ring
of black circling the white dot on his
side — leaped clear of the water, clear
of the spiny-man’s head. Simulta-
neously he whirled belly-up, caught the
spinny-man between the shoulders as
he shot back to the water. In that split
second the horse-fish spines did their
damage. They scraped an ugly red
line straight down the spiny-man’s
horny backbone.

“A question of who’s the toughest,”
Windy muttered. “Only there’s no
question about it. That gash’ll lay the
fellow low. All they’ve got to do now
is rip his guts out.”

“Watch, Windy!” Bill fairly
shrieked. “There’s the thing I was
telling you — ”

The fight was suddenly over. The
big horse-fish that had taken the back-

to-back slide stopped it. He gave an
imperious waggle with his head and the
three remaining horse-fish shrank back.
When one of them threatened to attack
again he darted challengingly. All
three of his companions were bluffed
out. It was obvious, Bill noted, that
these horse-fish held a healthy respect
for each other’s spines, no matter how
much they disagreed on their motives.

“I don’t get it,” said Windy Muff
blankly, as he watched the hard-faced
spiny-man swim off to safety. “That
big fellow with the bull’s-eye mark-
ings on his sides turned into a friend
awful sudden-like.”

“That’s the very way Yellow Z did
when he was fighting me,” said Bill.
“At the very moment he had me down
and could have killed me, he went soft-
hearted and called the gang off.”

“I don’t get it,” Windy repeated.

“I don’t either,” Bill admitted. He
lingered at the window until “Bull’s-
eye” and the other horse-fish swam
away. “What about that barred win-
dow you were going to show me?”
They followed the wall of their pri-
vate chamber along the side opposite
the sea window. The artificial wall was
a patchwork of masonry that filled in
between pillars of natural stone. Back
in a narrow alcove that reminded Bill
of a street car vestibule, bars of light
from the larger cavern world seeped
in between bars of steel.

“You’ll need these,” said Windy, un-
fastening a pair of binoculars from his
belt. “Get a focus on that peach-
colored haze ’way to your right and
you’ll see the other city. I’ll take my-
self back to the telephone.” . . .

P'OR the next two hours Bill stayed
at the window studying the lay of
the land.

The binoculars brought him a minia-
ture world — or was it two worlds?

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

There were two kinds of creatures in it
— very different creatures — and yet
they had certain pronounced points of
resemblance.

The spiny-men (including the spiny-
women and spiny-children) lived among
the uplands on the farther side of the
river. That was the east side, if Bill’s
sense of direction served him. And
what he chose to call uplands were, of
course, actually beneath the level of the
sea. But the main cavern was so vast
and its ceiling so lofty that there was
room for little hills and valleys, lakes,
waterfalls, innumerable ramifying
caves, and one river as broad as a boule-
vard.

This river appeared to divide the
low arched mud huts of the horse-fish,
on the west, from the statelier brick and
mud homes of the spiny-men, on the
east.

The river widened into a lake at what
might be called its mouth. It couldn’t
be seen to flow into the sea, for at
this depth nothing less than a system
of artificial water gates could empty
a river into the sea without allowing the
sea to backwater into the whole cavern.

The cavern itself, Bill guessed, had
been hollowed out by water during long
ages past. Later some caprice of na-
ture, perhaps an overflow of lava from
some volcano up above, had spilled the
gigantic icicles of rock across the mouth
of the cavern. The skyscraper-sized
icicles had melted together in a fortress
against the sea. And somehow the
creatures who had chosen to dwell here
had managed to force out the im-
pounded water.

But the horse-fish, at least, were still
water-dwellers. Bill, turning the
binoculars on the west bank of the river
and its numerous inlets, observed that
most of the gray mounds of the horse-
fish city had no visible doors. The en-
trances were under water.

One matter was continually confus-
ing, however. There were some houses
that he could not classify. Worse,
there were some creatures he could not
classify. For farther up the stream, he
noted, there ceased to be any clear-cut
division between the city of the horse-
fish and that of the spiny-men. The
two appeared to be hopelessly merged.
And from this distance he could not tell
whether those little creatures molding
pottery far up the river were horse-fish
or spiny-men.

This was disturbing.

Bill’s attention returned to the mat-
ter of sunlight. The hazy peach-colored
light that had sifted through the ceiling
far to the right, perhaps two miles dis-
tant, had turned to the amber of sun-
set, and now it melted into twilight
gray.

So this undersea pocket had an out-
let to the upper world, thought Bill.
The city of the spiny-men had at least
a limited daily taste of sunshine, blue
sky, clouds.

AS THE last of daylight faded, the

L lines of artificial lights along the
distant wall brought into view a zigzag-
ging trail to the upper world.

A party of spiny-men was ascending
that trail, carrying lanterns. Occa-
sionally Bill thought he could see them
waving their arms. Now and again he
heard the rolling echoes of high voices
that might have been laughter and
shouting.

Then he caught sight of two figures
descending the trail from the upper
w'orld, slowly moving down the incline
toward the party with the lanterns. At
once Bill guessed what was happening.

He chased back to the front of the
chamber where Windy was still listen-
ing in at the silent phone.

“Let me have it, Windy! ”

“Sure. Say— there’s a lotta talk

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP

about a guy named Vin-Vin. Would
that be your pal?”

“Sure as shootin’! Let me hear!”

“He’s surprisin’ ’em by droppin’ in
unexpected. The phones are full of
it.”

Windy accepted the binoculars,
trudged off to see what Bill had seen.

Bill adjusted the ebony posts to his
head. In a moment the talk began to
come in. It was confused, as if dozens
of parties were talking — or rather
thinking — to each other over the same
connections.

But the outstanding news was the
same throughout: Vin-Vin had re-

turned for his “annual visit” much
earlier than expected. There must be
some reason. What could it be?

“Did Vin-Vin bring any converts with
him?” many would ask.

“There’s one guest,” the answer
would come.

Occasionally, however, the messages
would vary. There was one other ex-
citing bit of gossip: The horse-fish had
acquired some new prisoners.

“As soon as Vin-Vin is welcomed,”
some were saying, “he must be in-
formed that the horse-fish have some
upper-world prisoners.”

The excitement was tremendous.
The impact of these events obviously
made big talk throughout the spiny-man
community. And perhaps the horse-
fish community as well. Bill picked
up some startling implications.

For one thing, it was a strange fact
that the horse-fish and the spiny-men
employed a single interwoven system of
communication. The horse-fish had
access to the conversations of the spiny-
men, and vice-versa.

Another striking fact was that George
Vinson was evidently a big man in this
underground world. The way his re-
turn was being heralded, Bill wondered
if he might be the ruler.

At any rate these were Vinson’s home
people. That was a certainty — a very
disturbing one. After all the years Bill
had known Vin and been allowed to
wonder over Vin’s peculiarities — his in-
evitable gloves — his mane of fine hair
that flowed over the back of his neck —
at last Bill was seeing the man’s roots
for the first time.

JT MAY have been midnight or later

when a silent phone message came to
Bill.

He had almost dozed away, listening
to the profuse speeches of welcome,
hearing the flowery address by Thork,
first assistant to the spiny-man ruler.

But soon after the whole underground
world had seemingly tucked itself away
for the night, a crystal-clear thought-
wave came over the wires.

“Bill Pierce . . . I’m calling Bill
Pierce ... He may be here as a pris-
oner — oh, you’re there, Bill! You
made it! That’s remarkable. I was
horribly worried.”

“I’m all right, Vin,” Bill spoke the
words aloud in his enthusiasm. “Every-
thing’s okay, I guess.”

“You sound nervous. Sick or any-
thing?”

“No — that is, my backbone’s healing
up all right.”

“Oh — too bad, fellow. So a horse-
fish got you, eh? I was afraid of it.
Those things can be fatal, you know.
But if luck’s with you, you come
through with a friend. You know what
I mean?”

“I guess so,” said Bill. “Yellow
Z— ”

“I’ll get in touch with you just as
soon as I can make it. I’ll be tied up
with more or less ceremony through to-
morrow. It’s inescapable. You’ll un-
derstand, Bill, after I’ve had a chance
to explain.”

Bill made no answer. He felt that

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

his limping conversation was widening
into a social chasm between them.

“Don’t be downhearted, fellow.” Vin-
son mustered a hearty manner. “You
know what I think?”

“What?”

“I think we’ll find Bea Riley alive.
I think the horse-fish took her by
chance and got away with her. If they
did they’ll put her to work somewhere
near these caverns. So don’t lose hope
— er — ”

Vin broke off abruptly.

Bill struggled to suppress what leaped
to the surface of his mind. Vinson, at
the other end of the thought- wave tele-
phone, must have sensed his confu-
sion.

“You haven’t seen her, have you, Bill
. . . Oh, you have / . . . Alive?”

“Yes.”

“You talked with her?”

“A little,” Bill admitted.

“M-m-m.” Vin was slightly defen-
sive. “Then, she told you — er — about
me”

“She said she’d known you before.
She mentioned you were a right guy —
but she’s always said that.”

“We’ve got to save her, Bill. It’s
more than simply saving a life. She’s
a potential contributor to the race. My
race. The future generations need her.”

“I don’t know anything about that,”
Bill retorted bluntly. “But 1 need her.”

“I’ve got to see you, Bill. Where are
you?”

"OILL described the prison chamber.

He mentioned that Windy Muff
had found his way into the same jail.

“Have you seen anyone, other than
horse-fish?” Vinson asked. “Any spiny-
men, I mean?”

“Only one at close range,” said Bill,
and he described the fight that had
taken place outside his window.

“That spiny-man was Thork, the

king’s lieutenant,” said Vinson, and the
mood of his thought-waves tightened
with a self-enforced tolerance.

In a more eager humor he returned to
the subject of Beatrice Riley.

“You don’t happen to know,” Vin’s
thoughts asked, “what they did with
Bea — which way they took her —
whether she was on foot or in a cylinder-
cart — whether they put her to work on
a batch of horse-fish eggs, or — ”
“Eggs!”

Bill echoed the word with such
amazement that Windy bounced up
wondering what was the matter.

“If you’re orderin’ breakfasts,”
Windy hissed, “make mine — ”

Bill waved him away. But Windy’s
intrusion, he knew was his own good
fortune. It enabled him to suppress
some answers that might otherwise have
leaped over the phone from his mind to
Vin’s.

That mustn’t happen. Bea Riley
had made it plain that Bill’s good friend
Vin wasn’t to cross her path.

“I’ll talk with you later,” Bill man-
aged to say.

“I’ll see you soon,” Vin concluded
as heartily as. ever.

Bill, perspiring, moved away from
the pink-globed phone, made for the
fresh water spring. He needed a cool
bath. That conversation had been an
ordeal. For all he knew he might have
revealed the very thoughts he meant to
suppress.

CHAPTER IX

A slush-slush-slush of a distant water -
fall beat on Bill’s ears. Other than
this low intermittent roaring the night
was silent. All lights had been dimmed
throughout the cavern.

Slush-slush-slush — as rhythmic as
the ticking of a grandfather clock.

From the barred window Bill could

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP

make out the narrow ribbon of water
that plunged down a series of falls. The
falls were beyond the spiny-men’s city,
in a high crevice-like branch of the cav-
ern. Earlier in the evening, Bill knew,
these falls hadn’t been visible. They
must have come with the high tides,
he reasoned, they would. go silent when
the waters receded.

Slush-slush-slush. Bill went to work
with a chunk of stone, synchronized his
strokes to the rhythmic roar, chopped
at the wall around the steel-barred win-
dow. Probably there were no guards to
listen; at any rate the sounds of his
battering would be submerged.

Windy roused up from sleep and took
his turn at stone-cutting while Bill
rested.

“You’re a bear for work,” he said,
as Bill went back to the task. Slowly
the stubborn stone wore thin.

One steel bar had just begun to give
when the lights of morning began to
turn on.

Soon shafts of pink sunlight pressed
through the vast ceiling over the east-
ern section of the big cavern. Mean-
while the wall grew brighter, voices of
spiny-children began to echo from
across the river. Nearer at hand the
brilliant green heads of horse-fish nosed
across ponds and inlets. Horse-fish
padded across yards of wet sand, gath-
ered in groups, gestured to each other
in their own language of signs.

“See if there’s anything on the phone,
Windy,” Bill ordered. “The day’s be-
ginning.”

Windy groaned out of his sleep,
yanked at his towsled red hair as if try-
ing to remember where he was. Then
he came up with a start.

“Didja get through, Bill?”

“Not quite.”

“Dammit, I shouldn’t have slept.
W T hy’d you let me do it?”

“You were all in, Windy. Anyway

one bar’s beginning to loosen. But we’ll
have to slack up now . . . Oh-oh,
they’re at the door.”

Bill kicked some dust to hide the
stone chips at his feet, brushed sand
over his ripped and bleeding hands.
By the time the circular steel door
opened he was lying in the sand, pre-
tending to be half asleep.

The visitors were the four servant
horse-fish bringing a tray of breakfast
— more fried sea foods on plates of
shell. The horse-fish looked around,
satisfied themselves that all was well,
and went on their way.

"DILL and Windy breakfasted and lis-
tened at the telephone by turns,
but no messages of consequence came
through.

Meanwhile the horse-fish with the
yellow Z on his sides paddled up to the
sea- window to begin his diy of watch-
ing.

“He makes me nervous,” Windy mut-
tered, casting sidewise glances at the
sea cavern.

“I wish I could get him on the phone
once and see what’s eating on him,”
said Bill. “He’s going to cramp our
style. Especially if he tells on us.”

“He can’t see our escape window
from his post,” said Windy. “We could
go ahead — ”

“Risky,” said Bill. “The tide’s going
down and the waterfall has nearly
stopped. We’d be heard. But we may
have to take a chance — ”

Bill broke off with a low whistle. He
brushed his breakfast aside and sprang
to the sea window. A cylinder was
floating past.

“That’s your gal friend again, ain’t
it?” said Windy.

Bill scarcely heard, he was too busy
pounding on the window and beckon-
ing. The upper third of the upright
cylinder was floating above the surface

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

of the water. Through the transparent
domed lid he could see Beatrice. The
same instrument was clamped to her
head. Her eyes were closed. She
looked pale. She was sleeping. Or
was she ill— or even —

Sharp chills pierced through Bill’s
arms down to his fingertips.

But no, she was not dead. She was
breathing slowly. He could see her
plainly. The cylinder was wafted along
by sluggish currents. Passing within
twenty feet of the big window it caught
light from the prison chamber.

Bill watched, motionless, half hyp-
notized by the sight. Bea’s pallid face
revealed such a resigned calmness and
patience. As ever, there was that deep,
mysterious beauty —

Bill caught his breath.

The cylinder was floating past, now,
turning so he could no longer see her.

A strange terror seized him. ' He
drew back from the window clenching
his fists. His dread of the unknown
suddenly welled up into a nameless
horror.

“I don’t know what’s happening.
Watch her, Windy, till I — ”

His feet were ahead of his words.
He dashed back to the other end of the
chamber and into the little stone-walled
vestibule with the barred window. He
rattled the loosened bar.

Then he heard Windy calling him
to come back.

“Look, Bill. What’s Yellow Z up
to?”

Bill returned on the run. In the
preceding moments he had ignored the
curious blinking eyes of the horse-fish.
But now he saw what the creature was
doing. Yellow Z was pushing the cyl-
inder back toward the window, turning
it so that the girl’s face was toward
them.

“How’d he know I wanted her to
come back?” Bill uttered nervously.

“Damned if he ain’t on our side!”
Windy chuckled.

“Either that or he’s scheming . . .
What the hell!"

q-’HE yellow - marked horse - fish
whirled the cylinder with aston-
ishing suddenness, grabbed it by a
choice hand-hold and went swimming
off with it as hard as he could go.

Bill smacked his head against the
glass in his eagerness to see where the
cylinder was going. That end of the
underground lake was too dark to see
far. Bill watched until the object
diminished to shadowy bubble. It cut
an arc through the dark waters and
disappeared from sight.

Bill stepped down from the window
with the air of a caged lion.

“That durned horse-fish,” Windy
muttered, “has got a screw loose. He’s
the most inconsistent critter — ”

“I’m gonna get out of here!” Bill
yelled, kicking at the sand.

“Didn’t he fight you one minute and
save you the next? . . . Huh? . . .
Look, Bill! There’s some more cornin’.
Yellow Z musta seen ’em.”

Bill whirled back to the window in
time to see a black-haired spiny-man
swim into view. It was the same stony-
featured spiny-man who had fought
here the day before. Thork was the
name, Bill recalled. This fellow, ac-
cording to the telephone messages, was
the lieutenant to the king.

The swimmer stopped directly before
the window, turned to beckon to some-
one back of him. Over the silver-
tinted waters to the east a few other
swimming creatures were following in
his wake.

Thork waited, watching them ap-
proach. Once he turned his head to-
ward the prison window, and his first
half-minute stare at Bill and Windy
brought a sour scowl to his face. He

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP

did not appear to be particularly sur-
prised — and Bill guessed that he had
probably heard rumors of their cap-
ture. He shrugged and looked away.

Now the rest of the party swam into
view; three horse-fish and one more
spiny-man. It was not a chase this
time. It was more nearly a council.
Thork had evidently led the others to
this spot to explain what had happened
in yesterday’s fight, for he began talk-
ing and pointing with great animation.
A faint rumble of his low voice echoed
through the glass, though Bill could
understand nothing.

But obviously the three horse-fish
were listening critically. They punctu-
ated Thork’s rapid-fire story with ges-
tures, occasionally forcing him to
change his claims.

Then, for the first time, the face of
the second spiny-man came into view.
It might have struck Bill as being a
handsome face for a human creature
whose backbone was lined with little
horn-like spines, and whose fingers were
connected with webs. But this face
was more than handsome — it was intel-
ligent, honest — and definitely familiar.
This was George Vinson.

Bill should have been prepared for
the shock. But somehow he was not.
He had never seen Vin before except
as a neat little man dressed in white,
and never without white gloves. Never
without his artistic head of hair flow-
ing loosely to the back of his neck.

In the heat of the conference with
Thork and the three horse-fish, George
Vinson’s bright beady eyes shot a look
at Bill. It was a look that said, “I
know you’re there, friend. I’ll get to
you when this job’s over. One trouble
at a time. I’m a busy man down in
this world.”

TT was startling how much genuine
importance there was about Vinson,

even when stripped of his fine clothes
and swimming about in bathing trunks.
Even when arguing with a fellow spiny-
man and three horse-fish. When Vin
spoke, his words counted.

And they were counting now. He
was reeling off his opinions, wasting
no words. The horse-fish nodded their
agreement. Thork appeared to be swal-
lowing a bitter pill, but he finally
nodded too.

Vin gave a wave that seemed to in-
dicate everything was settled.

Then Thork did some more pointing,
this time in the direction that Yellow Z
had swum away with the cylinder.

“Thork’s changed the subject,”
Windy observed shrewdly. “He lost his
argument about the fight, so he’s tryin’
to start somethin’ else.”

Bill breathed uneasily. “Do you sup-
pose he saw Bea?”

“What if he did?” said Windy.
“Would that be bad?”

“Plenty. She doesn’t want to be
seen by these spiny-men. She’s got
some mysterious connections down
here. She’ll blow up if they find her.
Rather than face them, she’d — ” Bill’s
agitation broke loose in a violent snarl.

Vve got to get out oj this trap l”

He caught himself, stopped his nerv-
ous pacing. The whole group outside
the window were watching him. Ex-
pressions of curiosity were on their
faces.

“They’re talkin’ about her, all right,
an’ us too,” Windy whispered. “They’ll
be in here quizzin’ us next. If they do,
I won’t know whether I’m cornin’ or
goin’, that’s the devil’s truth . . .
There they go.”

Bill saw Vin disperse the party with
a wave of his webbed hand. But the
creatures did not all swim away in the
same direction. The stony-faced Thork,
shooting another cold glance into the
prison chamber, sped off in the direc-

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

tion Yellow Z had taken the cylinder.

The instant the sea-window was
cleared of spiny-men and horse-fish,
Bill strode back to the other corner of
the chamber. He grabbed a rock, went
to work battering the steel bar like a
mad man.

Windy spelled him off. In a matter
of minutes they succeeded in jerking
the first bar out of its sockets. But
Bill jammed it back and he and Windy
both ducked — none too soon. A gang
of horse-fish led by “Bull’s-Eye” had
trailed into view. Bill could hear them
padding along the sandy trail.

Presently they were out of hearing.
But other footsteps were approaching.
A knock sounded at the circular metal
door.

“It’s Vin, Bill,” came the voice from
the other side of the door. “I had to
come back the long way around. Are
you all right in there? Plenty of food
and water?”

“We’re okay,” said Bill.

“Then I’ll settle up this murder mess
of Thork’s before I come back to get
you out,” Vin called. “These horse-
fish have their rights, you know, and it
pays to handle them with gloves. You
won’t worry if it’s two or three hours?”
“We won’t worry,” said Bill.

'"j~'HERE was a moment of silence.

Bill realized his answers had been
terse, far from cordial. He added,
“Take your time, Vin.”

“That’s the spirit, Bill.” Vin’s
heartiness was quick to respond. “I’ll
have this door open before noon. And
you must be ready to tell me what you
know about Bea.”

Another silence.

“Did you hear what I said, Bill?
You’ll have to help me with Bea.”

“I heard.”

“Good. We’ll have to work some
tall strategy on the horse-fish to get

her. They’re killers, you know, under
certain conditions. It’s a constant job
to hold down the number of fights with
them. And we’re having to bargain
with them, just now, for too many
favors. Do you understand the source
of their treachery, Bill?”

“Not altogether.” Bill was kneeling
at the keyhole of the circular door r
listening eagerly.

“Then I’d better tip you off right
now,” came Vinson’s voice. “They can
be your best friends — or your worst
enemies. They’re our cousins, in a
sense, and they’ve got a streak of in-
telligence you won’t find a match for
anywhere in the upper world. But their
emotions are unstable. You under-
stand?”

“Yes,” said Bill.

“Their prickly spines may not look
like blotters, but that’s exactly what
they are. Blotters. They absorb the
emotions and desires and sentiments of
other creatures. If one of them tears
along your backbone while he’s fighting
you, he picks up a whole set of feelings
from you .”

“So that’s it!” Bill gasped. “That’s
why Yellow Z let me off easy after that
first gash.” *

“Right. Your feelings became his
feelings. That’s why they’re treacher-
ous, Bill. You may think you’ve got a
horse-fish friend — one that’ll stall off
all possible trouble — but if he scrapes
the back of your enemy and picks up a
new set of feelings — look out .”

“I get it,” said Bill.

“Now you see what we’ve got to work
with,” Vinson concluded. “The sooner
we can get Beatrice out of their
clutches, without upsetting the apple-
cart, the better for everyone. And be-
lieve me, Bill, the city of spiny-men will
have one tall celebration when they
learn that Bea-Bea has come back to
them. So long, Bill.” /

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP

“Wait. Are you still there?” Bill
called at the keyhole.

“Yes?”

“What was this business you men-
tioned over the thought-phone? Some-
thing about eggs?”

“Oh, that. I’ll tell you when I come
back.”

Bill and Windy listened until the
footsteps retreated out of hearing. Then
they slipped back to the window.

“Any last minute instructions, Bill?”
Windy asked.

“Keep your ears to the phone, Windy.
If the horse-fish miss me tell ’em I
buried myself under the sand for a nap.
Or tell ’em nothing.”

With that Bill hoisted himself to the
window, wormed through. He turned
back to Windy for a last word.

“If you don’t hear from me within
twenty-four hours, you’ll know Bea
and I have sneaked through to the sur-
face. Then you can tell Vin thanks,
but we couldn’t use his help.”

CHAPTER X

T)ILL moved with the stealth of a
leopard. He picked his course from
shadow to shadow.

He knew the cavern lake could be
reached only by a round-about trail.
There was hardly a chance he could
reach Bea ahead of Thork. He’d hung
back like a docile prisoner too long.

But his blood was boiling now. He
cursed himself with every leap and
bound for letting Bea stay in the cylin-
der. Now she’d be grabbed by the
spiny-men — the very thing she feared
most.

Why did she abhor them so?

Bill wasn’t sure. But he had a dozen
vague guesses— all of them too horrible
to face. He was blind to everything,
now, except getting her out of this weird
hole.

Every time Bill dashed past a pink-
lighted pole he felt like stopping to see
what new talk was flying through the
cave. Thork had probably found her
—perhaps the whole spiny-man city
knew by now.

And would that city prepare a wel-
come for her, as Vin had predicted?
What was the spiny-men’s city to Bea?
The hot blood of an almost insane an-
guish pounded through Bill’s arteries.

Bea must belong here!

But how could she? Her body was
the perfect body of a human being. In
the thousands of public appearances she
had made in her abbreviated diving cos-
tume, her splendid physique had never
failed to charm Jhe audience. In the
graceful lines of her back there wasn’t
a hint of spiny-men features. Nor were
there any signs of webs between her
fingers or toes.

She couldn’t be a spiny-woman! And
yet —

Bill couldn’t throw the thought out
of his mind. Pictures flooded upon
him — -the views he had caught while
studying the spiny-men’s city through
the binoculars.

Yes, he had seen all varieties of
spiny-folk. Some had merged indistin-
guishably with the horse-fish. On the
other hand some had looked so much
like upper-world men, from his dis-
tance, that it had left him wondering
about it.

Now Bill was nearly a mile east of his
starting point. The river’s waters, piled
deep against the artificial doorways to
the sea, were not far ahead. He had
followed the trails along the base of the
south wall to keep his distance from
scattered groups of horse-fish going
about their work.

Bill stopped, slipped into a rocky
crevice. A party of horse-fish were ap-
proaching. He crowded against the
rock.

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

HPHE ten or twelve female horse-fish
passed without seeing him. They
had evidently just returned from the
open sea, for they were lugging arm-
loads of fresh seawead. Bill must be on
the right trail.

He raced on. Wherever scraps of
seaweed had dropped he grabbed them
up on the run, slapped them over his
shoulders for camouflage.

At last, taking a chance on being seen
from the houses on either side of the
river, he slipped up a steep pathway to
an opening in the vast curtain of lava
rock. Dripping seaweeds had been
dragged through the narrow A-shaped
pass. Ahead was darkness.

Then his eyes adjusted, he saw the
silver edged waters at his feet. This
had to be the cavern lake.

Shaking off the cloak of seaweeds, he
plunged in and swam back to the west.
He knew the speed he could hold for
distance swimming. The unlighted cav-
ern might have been an entrance to the
end of the world. The black waters
were devoid of dimensions, to Bill’s
eyes. Only the dim outlines of mam-
moth stone icicles, wet from seepage,
gave the cavern any form whatsoever.

Then Bill began to pass big lighted
windows. Here again were those ubiq-
uitous signs of the mechanical civiliza-
tion of upper-world men.

Here was a series of pumping sta-
tions. Both spiny-men and horse-fish
were working the big crude waterpower
machines.

Farther on Bill swam past the pink-
lighted windows of prison chambers.
The rock-walled rooms, though they
contained glowing telephones, were
empty, for their circular doors stood
open. Near the sea-window of one cell
an old dry human skull grinned out at
Bill — or was it a spiny-man skull?

In either oase, it testified to a tragedy
of years ago, perhaps starvation, or a

battle to death, or an insane suicide.

Now Bill swam past the cell he recog-
nized. He caught a brief sight of Windy
Muff with his head at the telephone, his
eyes blinking up at the walls. Windy
was a statue of bewilderment. Whether
the thought-phone was alive with
strange messages or whether Windy
was day dreaming of the stories he
would tell if he ever got back, Bill could
only wonder.

Without slackening his strokes Bill
sped on.

Then something was swimming to-
ward him. He surface dived. He put
many yards back of him before he
crawled back to the surface.

The swimming form was back of him
now, following in his wake.

Four times he surface-dived, to cut
along under the waters at high speed.
Then a streak of light cut the race short.
The swimming form was Yellow Z.

Still a friend? With an odd sensa-
tion of self-consciousness Bill spoke
aloud.

“If you’re on my side, fellow, take
me to that floating cylinder.”

He hung back as the horse-fish cut
ahead of him.

"VrELLOW Z swam in a wide arc to
the right, Bill in his wake. The
cavern lake was narrowing. Slits of
light through the ceiling hundreds of
feet overhead restored Bill’s sense of
direction. But those narrow vertical
gashes offered no hope of escape.

Suddenly Yellow Z grabbed Bill by
the hand and jerked him into the
shadowed waters. Yellow Z crawled up
on a ledge of dry rock and peeked over
cautiously. Bill followed his example.

Sounds of splashing and paddling
echoed through the lake-filled canyon.
At the bend the rush of swimming fig-
ures came into view.

“Thork, again 1” Bill muttered under

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP

his breath. “And Bull’s-Eye.”

But those two weren’t all. A gang
of horse-fish were on their trail. Thork
had got himself into another mess with
the horse-fish !

This time, Bill saw, Thork was avoid-
ing a fight. Or more accurately, Bull’s-
Eye was preventing it. The white-
dotted horse-fish was darting back and
.forth, keeping the rest of the gang at
bay while Thork swam full speed ahead.

His course was back toward the cities
— over the same waters Bill had just
come. And now Bill saw, with immense
relief, that the glass-domed cylinder
was in full view almost directly below
him.

It was still floating upright, still
lighted, still occupied.

Bea’s uptilted face was chalk-white,
her eyes were closed. She was half-re-
clining, and the slow rhythmic rise and
fall of her breasts told that she was
sleeping easily. The instruments at her
head had not been moved since he last
saw her being towed away from the
prison window.

This, then, was where Yellow Z had
brought her for safe hiding. And here
the lieutenant of the spiny-men had fol-
lowed.

But Thork’s visit had just now been
foiled by the savage horse-fish. The
splashing echoes of that chase were fad-
ing. This moment was Bill’s chance.

“Here goes, Yellow Z ! ” he said aloud.
“We’re going to crack this safe before
you can wink your little red eyes.”

The hand of Yellow Z slapped over
Bill’s wrist as Bill was lowering himself
over the ledge. But Bill was in no mood
to be restrained. He jerked free, slipped
into the water, swam once around the
cylinder, and began jerking all the
valve levers furiously.

He paid no attention when Yellow Z
caught him by the shoulder. He shook
the webbed hand off. For now the

valves opened and he knew the way in.

He caught half a breath, dived into
the water-filled aperture at the cylin-
der’s base. Once he had to kick off
Yellow Z’s troublesome grab at his
ankle. Then he was free to rise through
the valves toward the upper floor.

“Bea! Bea!” he called, as he climbed
upward. “You’ve got to get out of here,
Bea. Wake up! The spiny-men know
you’re here. They’re laying for you ! ”

yti S HE swunk up to the level where
Bea’s feet rested he was aware that
something more than water had
drenched his body during his ascent
through the series of floors. A syrupy
liquid spilled over his shoulders, and
with it came a hundred tickling and
scratching sensations. As if he’d
broken through a wall of eggs.

The light from the dome of the cylin-
der blazed down on his dripping body
and he saw.

The mess was broken eggs — dozens
of them. Their brittle white shells had
crushed at his touch, and spilled their
contents.

Bill couldn’t be bothered. He gave
his gooey hands a swipe against the
cylinder walls, all the while shouting at
Beatrice. He slapped her feet. Then
rising to stand beside her, he jerked the
instruments off her head.

Her eyelids lifted heavily, then fell
closed.

“It’s me!” Bill uttered. “You’ve got
to wake up, Bea!”

He slapped her cheeks briskly. Her
head dropped forward, her eyes were
trying to open. Still, her arms hung so
limply that Bill knew this was more
than the stupor of sleep. It was ex-
haustion.

“Bill,” she whispered faintly. “It’s
you?”

“Bea, you know it is!” Come on.
Snap out of it.”

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

He tried to take her up in his arms.
It was difficult to help her when her
body was so limp.

“Where are we, Bill?”

“Getting out of here,” Bill puffed as
he dragged her down through the mess
of broken shells, down into the water-
filled valves. “Hold your breath, Bea.
Here we go.”

Then they were out in the cool waters.
;Bea was swimming listlessly on her
back.

“Hurry, honey,” Bill kept urging.

“I’m trying,” she said. “But I’m so
weak — hungry — ”

“Poor kid — you might have died in
that cylinder.”

“Cylinder . . . Oh!” she gasped.

In the diminishing light Bill saw her
eyes widen. She changed to a breast
stroke, quickening her speed.

He glanced back. Yellow Z hadn’t
followed. Instead the friendly horse-
fish had again mounted the ledge, and
there he sat as motionless as a moody
gargoyle on a cathedral wall.

P'OR THE next twenty minutes Bea

swam hard, and Bill knew she had
no energy for talking.

But when they approached the pink
lights of the prison windows, she slack-
ened her pace.

“We’d better cut around,” she said.
“If the natives find out I’ve come
back — ”

“They already know, Bea,” said Bill.
“That’s why — ”

“Who knows?”

“Thork, the king’s lieutenant. He
followed to the cylinder, but the horse-
fish drove him off.”

“Oh!”

Her faint tone conveyed a secret hurt
that was too deep for words. Then as
if bristling spines were suddenly
plunged into her flesh she cried.

“Bill! How did you get me out?”

“Through the valves.”

“I mean, how — without breaking the
eggs?” Her voice was wild with terror.
“You didn’t — ”

“I busted ’em all over myself,” said
Bill. “I didn’t know they were in there.
Why?”

“Oh, Bill!” she was sobbing bitterly.
She caught a muffled breath, let her face
drop under the surface, and swam on so
fast that Bill was left more than a
length behind.

CHAPTER XI

TX/'HEN they reached the A-shaped
'pass to the main cavern Bea
dropped on the bank utterly exhausted.
Bill lifted her up into his arms and car-
ried her.

But the webs of light along the vast
cavern wall opened her languorous eyes.

“Bill,” she breathed. “We’ve got to
hide— quick.”

“Just from the spiny-men — or the
horse-fish too?”

“Oh, you poor idiot!” she cried an-
grily. “The maddest spiny-man would
never hope to live twenty-four hours if
he had crushed a horse-fish’s eggs. It’s
fatal.”

Bill felt the weight of tragedy hover-
ing, about to descend. Every minute
of his return swim he’d suspected this
was coming, and yet he’d kidded him-
self with the silly hope it wouldn’t be so
serious. N

“Then they’ll all be set for a cap-
ture — ”

“Bill, frankly it would have been a
lot easier if you’d just taken poison —
and given a dose to me.” *

“To youl” Bill cried. “You didn’t
commit the blunder. I was the one. If
they think they can catch me and kill
me for it, let ’em try. But I’ll clear
you, if it’s the last thing I — ”

“Bill, you can’t. I’m the guiltiest , in

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP

their eyes,” she whispered hoarsely.
“I was charged with giving my thoughts
to those embryo horse-fish. I pledged
I’d do it. That was my job . . . Don’t
look at me so, Bill.”

“You’re not serious!”

“You can’t appreciate it,” Bea
moaned, “until you’ve lived down here.
But there’s a streak of something dif-
ferent in these green sea creatures — ■
an uncanny streak of wisdom that’s not
matched anywhere in nature. Not even
the smartest upper-world people we
know can store up knowledge the way
these horse-fish can. The spiny-folk
sometimes have a little of it — but not
much.”

“What are you talking about? Is
this some ungodly superstition?”

“It’s a quirk of nature, Bill. These
savage horse-fish can inherit men’s
thoughts. They’re like sponges or blot-
ters. Even before they hatch out of
eggs, they begin to take on their pat-
terns of thought. It’s very strange to
you, I suppose — ”

“It’s remarkable— -but what kind of
thoughts could you possibly transfer to
unhatched eggs, cooped up in that cylin-
der?”

“Any thoughts that happened to pass
through my mind. I just lay there day-
dreaming and sleeping. Whether I
happened to dream about diving exhibi-
tions or sailing back to the States or
reading books there were sure to be
plenty of elementary ideas mixed in.”
“Such as?”

“Well, habits of walking and talk-
ing, with ability to read the man-
ners of getting along peaceably with
other creatures, the feelings of loyalty
to your own friends- — there are hun-
dreds of such things involved in any
situations you happen to think about.
When upper-world babies are born they
don’t know about these things. They
don’t even know they’re going to have

to learn a language. Btit these baby
horse-fish come into the world with a
fair knowledge of English.”

OILL frowned darkly. He felt a
twinge of something like jealousy
or hatred.

After what he’d seen he couldn’t
doubt these weird facts. But he didn’t
welcome them. To think that these
silent, cruel little water beasts could
snap up men’s thought waves with no
effort — at no cost — for no good t
“Why haven’t the spiny-men wiped
them out?” he asked. “I can’t. see a
thing good about them. They’re more
treacherous than poison snakes — ”
“And friendlier than any human be-
ings, and more helpful — after they’ve
absorbed the right thought-waves,”
said Bea. “These thought-wave phones
all through the cavern help keep them
friendly. And still, they and the spiny-
men are forever clashing.”

Her eyelids closed. Her voice trailed
away.

“You’ve got to have some food and
rest before we can chance a dash out
of this place,” Bill whispered. “We’ve
got to pick the right moment—”

“As if it mattered,” she breathed.
“We’ll never get past them.”

He had carried her along a perilous
shelf of rock high above the river.
There were no foot tracks up here.
The beams from the nearest wall lights
rarely reached up to this level.

“I used to climb this trail when I
was a little girl,” Bea said. “I would
come up here and spy on both cities.
I saw so much trouble between the two
sides of the river that I grew to hate
it all.”

“We’ll soon be out of here— ^for
good,” said Bill. “Here’s a shadowed
spot. You’ve got to lie down and rest
before we go on.”

“Bill, we’ll never make it,” she

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

sobbed quietly, lying down on the warm
rock and folding her arm under her
head for a pillow. “There’s not a chance
in a thousand that the horse-fish will
let us live, after what’s happened. You
see, that’s why they took me off the
boat in the first place-— to care for
those eggs.”

Bill sat down near her, folded his
arms.

“Did they know it was you — a na-
tive?” he asked.

“Not at first. They’d simply swum
out to capture any upper-world fe-
male.”

“Then they go in for kidnapping as
a regular sport,” Bill muttered.

“They only steal a new upper-world
person when they have a need. Usually
their captive mothers don’t live many
years. Sometimes only a few months.”

“Beal You knew this . . . and yet
you submitted — ”

“They recognized me as soon as I got
down here,” she looked up at Bill guilt-
ily. “They remembered me as a spiny-
girl from across the river. You knew,
of course, that I am—”

“I guessed,” said Bill quietly, avoid-
ing her eyes.

“They recognized me,” she went on,
“as a native who had been away for a
few years. So I confided in them — and
made a bargain.”

“Yes?”

“I admitted I was a runaway. I
couldn’t endure living down here. But
if they would promise me my freedom
afterward, and yours , I would go ahead
and be the ‘thought-mother’ to this one
batch of eggs. In a few days it would
have been over.”

Bill understood. At first he was not
clear as to why the horse-fish had fol-
lowed their theft of Bea with a similar
kidnapping of Windy Muff. But
Beatrice explained that that, too, was
customary. The horse-fish always tried

to furnish their captured females with
mates. In this case, Bill understood,
they had failed to pull Maribeau the
scientist overboard, but had succeeded
in getting Windy Muff.

Bill shuddered as he turned these
bizarre customs over in his mind. But
practical considerations shook him into
action.

“I know where I can get some food,”
he said, “without being seen . . . And
if there’s a chance to listen in at a
phone — ■”

“Just food,” said Beatrice. “You
won’t want to hear what they’re saying
by now.”

CHAPTER XII

B tu - backtracked over his old trail
to the barred window of his prison
cell. He called in a whisper. Windy
Muff’s voice answered him.

“Darned if I didn’t think you were
hissin’ over the phone,” said Windy.
“Why don’t you come around to the
door an’ walk in? It’s wide open.”

“How come?”

“Vinson’s been here ’n’ gone. He
came to turn us loose an’ give us a free
tour of the city. But he found you
gone, an’ I told him I wouldn’t budge
from this spot till you came back.”

While Bill entered by the door and
gathered up the food Windy had saved
for him, the latter poured forth the ex-
citing news as fast as he could jabber.

Vin’s eyes had blazed cold fire,
Windy said, to learn that Bill had
broken out and gone to find Bea. Vin
had said it was a deadly thing to do,
and bad judgment.

“So you told him everything,” said
Bill heatedly.

“Yep. I’ve always said my reputa-
tion for bein’ a liar wasn’t deserved.
Well, he went on his way, sayin’ we
should both report to him as soon as

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP

possible.”

“Go and report to him,” said Bill
sharply. “But tell him not to look for
me.”

Bill started off, but Windy blocked
his path at the door. “Vin was right,
was he? You ran into trouble?”

“Plenty of it,” Bill admitted. In a
few words he related what had hap-
pened at the west end of the sea cavern.
He concluded by stating his doubts
whether Yellow Z was still a friend,
after what he’d done. “Anyway, they’ll
be after me — and Bea too — and she’s
got to pick up a bit of strength before
we can make a break for the top. . . .
So long, Windy.”

“Good luck, Bill.”

Back along the shadowed wall trail
Bill sprinted. By now the protective
shadows were familiar. In a few mo-
ments he was crawling the high narrow
ridge that arched above the river out of
reach of the lights.

Bea was not sleeping, he had hoped.
She had crawled several yards beyond
the sheltered spot where he had left
her. She was crowding close to the
overhanging edge, listening.

Her eyes flicked at Bill as he ap-
proached, inviting him to come join her.
She was listening to the clattering
voices rising from the excited spiny-
man city.

“The tension’s drum-head tight al-
ready, Bill,” she whispered. “They’re
stirred up on both sides of the river.
And have you seen the ascent?”

CHE pointed to the zig-zag trail to the
upper-world. Bill could see groups
of spiny-men stationed near the top.
Still further up was a cluster of horse-
fish.

“We’re not going to get out, Bill.
They’ll see to that.” •

“By this time they all know what
happened to the eggs, I suppose?”

“Yes. Yellow Z and some others
dragged the cylinder back into the
horse-fish city only a few minutes ago.”
“How’d the horse-fish take it?”

“It’s a good thing they can’t cry out
loud,” said Bea. “Look. Those
colunms swimming in figures and cir-
cles at the west side of the river are
expressing their anguish and grief.”
“Some are crossing the river,” Bill
observed.

“And there have been minor fights
with spiny-men. It’s times like these
that bring up all old animosities. All
my life down here I’ve watched it.
These two cities live forever on the
verge of war.”

Bea ate and slept while Bill kept
vigil.

Toward night a great mass meeting
came together on the east bank of the
river. It was formally opened by the
ruler of the spiny-men himself. Bea
gasped to see the aged, sharp backed
old creature totter down the path from
the triple-domed mud palace.

“That’s a rare sight,” Bea said.
“They don’t see him except on the
most important occasions.”

“What are they going to do?”

“I don’t know. I never saw the
horse-fish and spiny-men mass together
before.”

“Do the horse-fish have a king too?”
Bea shook her head. That was one
great reason for the constant trouble
with the green sea-creatures. They
weren’t emotionally stable. One of
their number might be in favor as a
leader for a time — but if he chanced
to stab his spine into the back of a
spiny-man— -or a native islander of the
uppers world— he’d absorb a new tem-
perament.

“You can’t have rulers or followers
among folks that are always changing
their natures,” Bea said. “So there’s
just the one king— -that old white-

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP

haired spiny-man.”

Bill listened. In a quaking voice
that spoke the tongue of an aged
English sea captain the spiny-man king
called the mass meeting to order. The
hundreds of horse-fish, ranged along
the river’s edge, were listening atten-
tively. Closer around the mud dais
were the clusters of spiny-men, wom-
en, and children.

The king, thought Bill, was little
more than a figure-head. He recited
a remarkable legend from memory- — a
fanciful tale of the shipwreck of cen-
turies ago, and the ravages of a volcano
and a tidal wave that left a band of
English explorers imprisoned here.

HpHEN his archaic sing-song recita-
A tion hinted that there was an
amazing fusion of two kinds of animal
life- — -man and horse-fish — the strange
nature of which only the gods might
explain. But the ancient English ex-
plorers need not be ashamed of that
amazing fusion, for nothing less could
have won the victory of survival.

This brought the king’s recitation
down to the present century when the
new and wonderful race of spiny-men
•emerged. It was the triumphant blend
of the best qualities of men and horse-
fish.

And at last, so the king’s story went,
trade and commerce had been estab-
lished with the upper-world, so that
sealoeks and pumps and electrical
miracles had been procured.

Then with a stereotyped promise that
the spiny-men were destined to become
the great earth-dwelling race of the
future, the king bowed low, turned, and
tottered back to his tripled-domed mud
palace at the foot of the ascent.

Now Thork, the hard-bitten lieuten-
ant, took charge. The real business of
the day began.

“No one denies that the horse-fish

have their rights,” he began, and with
his opening gun the spines of the horse-
fish began to bristle. “Many’s the
time the spiny-men have been too
liberal with the rights of you horse-fish.
You are asking me for examples? Don’t
be absurd. . .

Bill saw the implication. The horse-
fish who were wearing the portable tel-
ephones were asking questions, no
doubt. For the phones made their
thoughts transport to Thork, who was
likewise wearing a phone. As fast as
he spoke he was picking up their mental
reactions. He came back at them
angrily.

“Whenever some upper-world in-
nocent blunders into one of your sacred
cylinders, and messes up some eggs just
before hatching season, what do you
do? You horse-fish kill him. And
we spiny-men don’t raise a hand, be-
cause we’ve got in a habit of pamper-
ing you and your rights. . .

Bill whispered, “Is that bird getting
ready to take our sides?”

Bea doubted it. “I never knew him
to champion any outsider,” she said,
never taking her eyes off the crowd be-
low her.

Thork’s challenge continued. “This
time it happens you’ve dragged a spiny-
girl into your egg-training business.
And you’ve had a disaster. Well, let
me warn you. This side of the river
is waiting to welcome that girl. We’ve
been waiting a long time for her to
come back.”

Some of the horse-fish were remov-
ing their head-phones by this time, and
that, Bill knew, meant they didn’t want
their thoughts to be conveyed.

“In fact,” Thork went on, “this
spiny-girl is someone I’ve been par-
ticularly waiting for, ever since we let
her go away to be educated. . . And if
she’s within earshot of my voice, I want
her to know that she’s not going to pay

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

for the broken eggs. She’s oiir own.
There’ll be war in camp if you horse-
fish make one move to harm a hair of
her head!”

challenge ended on the harsh
note of “Knock a chip off my shoul-
der if you dare!”

Suddenly the whole riverbank of
green seemed to fold in slowly toward
the spiny-men. Not with a rush. . Just
a slow turtle-paced movement. The
green bags some were carrying, Bea
whispered, contained deadly scorpion-
fish, their favorite weapons.

“Stand where you are, horse-fish!”
The full-voiced command rang from the
throat of George Vinson. He sprang to
the dais. “Thork isn’t the only voice
in this city. Listen to me, horse-fish!”
The wave of slowly advancing horse-
fish stopped. The ranks of the spiny-
men, bristling for trouble, suddenly
quieted. It was plain that the black-
haired little mediator was respected by
both sides of the underground world.
At once he launched a feverish plea for
peace and harmony.

The girl was also his friend, he said;
and so was the man who had broken
jail and gone to find her. But there
were stouter reasons than these for
keeping peace. There was the vision
of great destiny which the spiny-men
held.

“And this vision, as I have told you
so many times,” George Vinson
pleaded, “ must have the cooperation of
the most highly developed upper-world
men and the most highly developed
horse-fish. The biological contribu-
tions of both are indispensable.”

Bill gasped, “Biological I” He looked
to Bea for an answer.

“That’s George Vinson’s big idea,”
she whispered. She drew closer to Bill
and answered his questions.

Yes, she had expected to marry an

upper-world man — that expectation
had been the terror of her childhood.
But a mixing of spiny-folk with upper-
world folk, she had been taught, was
the only way this superior underground
race would breed out the damning
marks which their crossing with horse-
fish had left on them — -webbed hands
and feet, and a row of more or less con-
spicuous spines over the backbone. So,
as a child Bea had been doomed to
marry one of the upper-world guests.

Yes, there were many such guests —
perhaps two or three a year. It was
George Vinson’s difficult task to go to
the upper-world and spread the gospel
of a finer race and to bring converts
back with him. The finest corals and
pearls from the nearby seas were spent
to make him a wealthy and respected
missionary. Many of his converts now
lived here; others died through mis-
fortunate dealings with the horse-fish;
and spme fled.

“You say you were to have married
an upperworld man?” Bill asked.

“They decreed otherwise as soon as
they saw I was becoming a young wom-
an — without spines or webs. Then they
decided I should go to the upper -world
for an education,” Bea sighed, “be-
cause I would not be conspicuous. When
I came back a suitable match would be
made for me here.”

Bill scowled. “When had you in-
tended coming back?”

“Never,” said Bea. “I loved the
upper- world. I hated all this — even
Vin with his fine theories. That’s why
I’ve almost hated myself. Because at
heart I know I’m a traitor.”

T>ILL slipped his arm around her,
patting her shoulder gently. She
was trembling. That, he knew, was
what Thork’s speech had done for her;
for the lieutenant’s hint of marriage had
had the twang of a threat.

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP

“I'm going to see that you marry an
upper-world man as soon as I can get
you out of here.” Bill looked down in-
to her clear eyes. He whispered
hoarsely, “I don’t know about these
spiny-men theories! And all this vision
business that Vin used to try to pound
into my head — it went right over me.
But I’ve got my own vision, Bea. It
begins right here, with me telling you
I love you — and you telling me the
same. . . . Say it, won’t you, Bea?”

“You make it sound so easy, Bill,”
she whispered. Her face lifted slightly
toward his. He crushed her lips in the
warmth of his kisses.

The speeches continued to well up
from somewhere below the ledge, but
Bill ceased to hear them. The ocean’s
high tide began to spill down through
the cavern in rhythmic gushes. But
Bill was oblivious to roaring waterfalls.
He heard nothing but the pounding of
Bea’s heart, and his own, and the en-
chanting whispers from the lips he loved
to kiss.

“You’ve got to promise you’ll marry
me, Bea. If you will, all spiny-men
and horse-fish together couldn’t keep
us down here. . . . Say it, won’t you?”

“I do love you, Bill,” she breathed.
“I can’t deny it. . . . But I’ll never
marry you. Don’t look so crushed,
Bill. Can’t you see — it wouldn’t be
fair to you— or to our children — be-
cause — because I’m a spiny-woman —
and you — you belong to the wonderful
world up there!”

CHAPTER Xlt!

'yiBRANT words were still ringing
from the river’s bank below them.
Bill, breathing heavily, began to hear
them in spite of himself. Dazed and
shattered, his attention returned to the
weird meeting.

“ Have you a chance to become the

masters of the world V*

It was the scientist, Jean Mari-
beau, wrapping the heterogeneous audi-
ence into a magic spell. George Vinson
had called upon him, as an authority
from the outside world, to express the
opinions he had formed in his recent
hours of observation.

“That’s Vin’s supreme strategy for
keeping peace,” Bea said in a low voice,
straining at the cliff’s edge to catch
every word. “Vin must have given this
man a curtain lecture. . . neverthe-
less — ”

Bill glanced sharply at her, surprised
to see how her interest had quickened.
The words of an upper-world scientist
might strike a new responsive chord —

“As a scientist I say that no creatures
ever lived who have a better chance
to inherit the earth than you spiny-
men. ... I do not overlook the con-
tributions from both of your lines of
ancestors. This instantaneous absorp-
tion of knowledge — an ability that is
being bred into your race through your
kinship with the horse-fish — is destined
to make the earth’s new man superior
to the old.”

Many horse-fish were nodding their
agreement, holding their heads proudly.

“In addition,” Maribeau went on, “it
goes without saying that the vast stores
of knowledge from the upper-world
men will become your birthright. . . .
But I must be brutally frank. There
are not enough of you — -spiny-men and
horse-fish combined — to so much as
conquer the island village over your
heads.

“What does this mean? It means
that you, the spiny-men, cannot afford
to lose one potential father or mother.
If Vin is able to convert upper-world
men to this cause, their biological con-
tributions will bend the race toward the
ultimate triumph. But let me be frank
again, at the risk of being brutal. You

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

creatures, you horse-fish — ”

'-pHE scientist hesitated, as if catch-
x ' ing warnings from the ranks of the
speechless green creatures.

“You horse-fish must not seek to in-
crease your numbers. Your contribu-
tions to the spiny -men have been made.
Your flashy intellect has taken root
among them. They now have the handi-
caps of partial spines and webs. But
they must not have the handicap of
speechlessness. That would be fatal
to their progress. So — ”

Horse-fish began to hoist their heads
belligerently.

“So — you sea creatures who have no
tongues — and that goes for every pure-
bred horse-fish I’ve observed — you
should cease to reproduce! I advise
you to destroy your own eggs, and to
commit racial suicide!”

The horse-fish rose up on their hind
legs. Dozens of them waved their
arms. Some reached into their green
bags and seized their deadly scorpion-
fish. Still, something held them back.
To Bill it seemed that a single battle-
cry would have galvanized them into
an army plunging forward to attack.
But without that battle-cry they were
only so many separate clusters of in-
dividuals.

Yet their bluff forced the speaker
to a quick conclusion. He ended by
reminding them of the immortality that
awaited all of them if they could in-
herit the earth. Evolution, he said,
was sympodial. It left many races out
on a dead limb. But now it could be-
come a conscious process, an instru-
ment in their own hands. And the
present upper-world man would pass
out of existence because it had become
over-specialized.

“Don’t forget that human life came
forth from the sea,” Maribeau shouted,
swinging his fists dramatically. “If a

new man evolves, he must receive his
fresh impetus from that cradle of all
life— -the sea.”

These words were almost more than
Bill could digest. It was hard to be-
lieve that the horse-fish could catch
their significance so readily. But along
with their alertness, their emotions
were up and down like a thermometer.
One moment they were enraged to be
told they should commit race suicide.
The next they were inflated by thoughts
of their wonderful contributions to their
descendants.

Once more they had stopped in then-
tracks, the whole body of nervous
horse-fish, listening, considering.

“Gad, what a narrow one,” Bill
whispered to Bea. “He’s got ’em
coming his way again. If they can take
it, it puts them and the spiny-men back
on £n even keel.”

Bea, her eyes intent upon the scene
below, made a surprising answer. “</
can take it. . . . For the first time I’m
getting a glimmer of the big, wonder-
ful thing Vin’s been preaching all these
years. ... Do you suppose — ”

“What, Bea?”

“Do you suppose it would work? . . .
Have I been blind?” She was rising
slowly, as if in a dream, and the light
from below showed an almost fanatical
fervor coming into her mysterious eyes.
“Would I get rid of this guilty traitor
feeling if I’d see it his way?”

“Who's way?”

“Vin’s. If I’d do what he wants me
to do — marry him — cast my lot with
him and the rest of my people — ”

JgILL nodded slowly. A new under-
standing was soaking into his dizzy
brain. Vin ... his friend ... the
swellest guy that ever lived. . . .

“So that — that’s it, is it, Bea?” All
the spirit was gone out of Bill.

“I believe that’s it — ”

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP

Bill’s arm reached impulsively, tried
to draw her back into the shadows.
“Wait. Don’t you want to think it
over?”

“I’m going to dive down to the river,
Bill, and swim over to them, tell them
I’ve come to stay. They need me. Vin
deserves — ”

“No, Bea!” Bill leaped up. “For
God’s sake, not in that spirit!”

She ran along the edge of the ledge,
stopped directly above the center of the
river. For an instant she was the
statue of the perfect woman, poised to
dive.

But the sharp voice of Thork rang
through the air. The meeting took a
weird turn back to violence. In one
brief, harsh pronouncement the ugly
lieutenant threw overboard all of Vin’s
and the scientist’s hard- won gains.

“I repeat, you horse-fish still have
your rights. We’ll leave the girl out
of this, because she’s a spiny-girl. And
I’ll swear to her innocence. But you
are entitled to a life in exchange for
those broken eggs.”

The horse-fish waved their webbed
hands like banners.

“Yes,” Thork shouted, “/ maintain
you are entitled to kill the upper-world
man who committed the crime!”

Bill caught only half a glimpse of
the pandemonium. He saw George
Vinson try to reach the speaker’s plat-
form. Windy Muff was helping him.
And the scientist, like the other two,
was shouting to the green sea-crea-
tures to hold their places and listen.

But Vin and his party were hurled
back by a gang of horse-fish waving
poison scorpion-fish in their faces.
Bull’s-Eye, the friend of the lieutenant,
was leading the gang.

At the same moment other groups of
horse-fish started chasing off in a dozen
different directions.

The spiny-men themselves jumped on

the bandwagon that Thork had set in
motion. Their shouts filled the air.
“Bring him in ! ” “What can we lose ! ”
“The horse-fish still have some rights /”
“x\nything to keep peace ! ” “Bring him
in!”

Bill caught his breath. Like arms of
an explosion these creatures were shoot-
ing out in all directions. The frenzy
of violence was on them. They were
after him.

At that instant Bea’s footsteps
pounded past him, her hand swished
across his shoulder.

“Follow me, Billl” she hissed.

Together they bounded over the
arched ledge to the eastward. They
leaped a narrow gap. Bill had the dizzy
sensation of flying over a hundred-foot
drop, with bright light glowing up
against his silhouetted bare feet and
legs.

Bea, only three paces ahead of him,
was racing with confidence. She must
have remembered these trails from
childhood. The toss of her dark tresses
showed that she was keeping an eye on
the zig-zag trails. They were hardly
a quarter of a mile away.

But suddenly she stopped, flinging a
hand back at Bill.

The ledge ahead was blocked off.
New seepage had cut off the trail since
Bea, as a child, had traversed this nar-
row path.

“Back! ” she panted, bounding ahead
of him. “Keep in the shadow!”

T) UT this time when they leaped over
the narrow gap they heard an ex-
plosive outcry from somewhere below.
The light had caught them.

They ran like wildfire now. It was a
race to the west end of the passage.
There, Bill remembered, they’d be able
to duck through the A-shaped entrance
to the dark sea cavern.

But as they chased down the incline

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

toward the western end of the narrow
ledge, they saw a cluster of webbed
hands rise in their pathway. Six or
seven horse-fish were scrambling up the
narrow arched path carrying their
poison weapons.

“Back again!” Bea shouted. And as
Bill tried to jerk a stone loose from
the frozen wall, she cried, “No! Come
on!”

Then he was running at her side,
heedless of the light. She gasped be-
tween breaths, “The fourth mound on
the left, Bill. . . , Can you make it
. . . under water? Come on. . . .
Stay right with me!”

They glanced back when they
reached the point above the center of
the river. The horse-fish were hurling
their weapons like handgrenades. A
poisonous lion-fish rolled in the stone
dust near Bill's bare feet, and its orange
and black fins stiffened for action.

“Together!” Bea panted.

They dived. On the descent Bill
gathered the confusion of sounds into
his ears, aware that he was plunging
from one danger to another. Gangs of
horse-fish would see and rush back to
the river. From the distance the slush-
slush of the waterfall was growing
stronger.

Together they plunged under for the
long under-water swim. Bea cut deep,
and Bill followed. For two minutes
- they shot straight up the central chan-
nel.

Now their ears caught the plunging
of other divers. Bea forced a swifter
pace. Then she suddenly plowed along
an inclined channel bottom and rose.
Bill followed her up through the dark-
ness. He came up into air.

The surrounding blackness of the
mud mound was relieved only by a few
narrow peepholes of light. Bill caught
his breath and followed Bea down
again.

For five swift breathless underwater
swims the chase went on. Each time
they came up in the horse-fish houses
for a breath they could see that their
pursuers were gaining ground. They
could see the panting gills, the blazing
little magenta eyes and savage mouths
skimming beneath the surface. Here
and there they caught glimpses of
webbed hands clutching specimens of
poisonous sea-life.

In the fifth empty mud hut they
entered, Bea choked, “It’s over!”

T>ILL heard a rush of water in the
black entrance through which they
had risen. The horse-fish would catch
them this time. There would be no
room to dart past a horse-fish in that
under-water passage.

But Bill sprang up, struck his husky
shoulders against the baked-mud roof.
It strained, cracked. The gash of light
showed the noses of horse-fish scram-
bling up out of the inky liquid. Bill
crashed the roof again and it crumbled
in a mass of debris. But he and Bea
were out and on the run.

“Quick headworkl” Bea’s smile
flashed at him from her dirt-smeared
face. It was a grim smile, aware of
the nearness of death, but there was
courage in it.

In the mad foot-race that followed,
Bill and Bea gained over the horse-fish.
They rounded the upper end of the
merged cities, leaping inlets, dodging
pools of imprisoned scorpion fish, pass-
ing small parties of creatures that were
neither horse-fish nor spiny-men but
something of both.

At nearly every turn a new surprise
party was awaiting them. Horse-fish
were trying to close in from all direc-
tions.

But not spiny-men. Somehow their
explosive violence had become disor-
ganized and they were doing more

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP

shouting than chasing. Bill understood.
They were willing to catch him; but
their discovery that their own Bea-Bea
was helping him race to freedom had
thrown them into confusion.

Now Bea ran straight over the triple
domes of the king’s mud palace and
jumped to the edge of the zig-zagging
ascent. Bill felt the mud roof break
under his feet and he bounded after
her. Then they were running side-by-
side up the trail. Somewhere high
above there was a patch of open sky.
But nearer at hand there were parties
of guards from both cities.

Two hundred feet up they came to a
dead stop. A semicircle of hardened
guardsmen with strong human faces,
slightly webbed hands, and spiny bare
backs bobbed up out of the stone-wall
barrier, marched forth to cut off the
trail from both directions.

The leader of the guards stepped over
to a pink globe and inserted his head
in the phone. Then he emerged and
barked his orders.

“Thork says we’re to hold Bea-Bea.
As for the man, we’re to let the horse-
fish guards have their own way with
him.” The leader whistled a signal
and twenty horse-fish, stationed a little
farther up the trail, came bounding
down over the rocks swinging loops of
sea-weed rope.

CHAPTER XIV

T) ILL and Bea stood on the point of
^ a hairpin turn, watching the semi-
circle of guards close their ranks. An
opening was left for the horse-fish to
gallop through, like a band of weird
cowpunchers on a rampage.

“Stay with me!”

Once again Bea’s courageous whisper
gave Bill his cue. Bea sprang over the
edge of the trail and caught herself on
a ledge twenty feet below. Then she

was off again, on what seemed to be
an uncharted road to sudden death.
Bill followed on her heels.

He followed without looking back,
though the sea-weed ropes were swish-
ing right back of him. Once a loop
caught on his forehead and he barely
ducked in time. If it had settled over
his neck he’d have gone tumbling down
the steep rocky wall, perhaps to hang
himself.

This was no marked trail. Bea was
fighting to catch the least perilous
handholds. In places the wall was like
the face of a skyscraper.

But every step brought them nearer
to the bounding two-hundred foot
waterfall. And now Bill guessed her
strategy.

“It’s our old dive, Bill!” Her eyes
flashed at him. “This is where I
learned it. Four swift death-leaps in
succession.”

Bill felt the spray of water on his
bare chest and legs. Then he felt the
snap of rope over his arm. The loop
suddenly tightened on his wrist.

He had an instant’s glimpse of the
three horse-fish jerking the other end
of the rope. They must have been mad
to take such chances, standing on a
four foot shelf.

As they jerked, Bill dropped into the
big rock basin where the vast fall of
water was roaring in and out. One hand
found a hold. The other was tending
the rope. It gave, and he saw the
three horse-fish fly out into space. Two
of them slipped off and fell down —
down-—

No one would hear them crush to
pulp. The roar of the falls would
drown that sound. But the hosts of
creatures below would see. Their little
faces were staring up —

Jerk ! The weight of the third horse-
fish couldn’t have pulled the rope that
hard. Bill struggled to free his wrist.

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

Momentarily he released his handhold.

“Careful, Bill!” Bea screamed. The
horse-fish that had held on had swung,
pendulum style, to wedge himself safely
in a crevice. There he applied the
leverage of his arms to the rope, and
pulled Bill over.

Bill saw too late. He skidded over
the slippery edge of the basin and shot
down with the fall.

/"\N the descent he barely succeeded
in freeing himself of the rope. He
straightened out with the falling water,
fought toward what appeared to be the
deepest point of the approaching pool.
He struck it for a shallow dive — and
was off again for the next waterfall
descent.

Then another — and a fourth.

And before he had had time to catch
his breath he was looking up from the
boiling surface of the river to see
Beatrice, with all her grace and beauty,
plunge down the same succession of
falls.

She bobbed up beside him. They
looked back at the mountainous wall
where several horse-fish guards were
perched. The little green figures showed
no inclination to duplicate the series of
dives. Then Bill and Bea turned to
face the hosts of spiny-men on the
riverbank. The crowds were cheer-
ing. . . .

“That’s for you,” Bill said. “Why
don’t you go back to them and stay
clear of my fate?”

“Because I want to share your fate,
Bill,” Bea swam close to him, reached
out to grip his hand. “I knew as soon
as they started after you that I was
wrong — about trying to stay here and
be loyal, I mean. I’d rather die with
you—”

The clamoring voices from the river-
bank were demanding that they come.
And though it was puzzling, the voices

carried no tone of menace. The shouts
were welcoming them, hailing them for
their valiant escape, heaping honors
upon them.

Bill and Bea obeyed. But it was
several minutes before they could un-
derstand the strange turn of events.
They wfere made to sit down on com-
fortable mats and relax. And Bill found
it impossible to relax with throngs of
spiny-men and horse-fish crowding
around.

At first everyone talked at once, but
soon the talking was left to Vin, with
interpolations from Windy Muff.

“I started it,” Windy said. “I fig-
ured it was time for me to do a little
lyin’ to get you outa trouble. So I told
the bunch that you wasn’t the one that
busted into the eggs. It was Thork.
I said I’d seen him with my own eyes,
an’ you only went in afterwards to
make sure he hadn’t got up in the top
of the cylinder to bother Bea.”

“And as we soon discovered,” said
Vinson, “Windy’s guess was right.
Yellow-Z discovered Thork’s foot-
tracks in the egg-compartment. There
was nothing for Thork to do but admit
it.”

“What happened to Thork?” Bill
asked anxiously, catching the flicker of
worry in Bea’s eyes.

“We fought,” said Vin. “We’ve al-
ways been enemies — and rivals. When
he found himself caught, he turned on
me. Bull’s-Eye tried to help him, but
it was a mistake, because Yellow-Z
jumped in on my side.”

Vinson paused to glance at the
bruised fist of his webbed left hand.

“That’s when you popped him,” said
Windy.

“Yes, I gave it to Thork and he took
an unfortunate spill.”

“Unfortunate?” said Bea.

“He fell,” said Vin, “against the
scorpion fish that Bull’s-Eye was try-

DWELLERS OF THE DEEP

ing to use on me. It got him. I think
he’ll die before morning, in spite of the
care they’re giving him.”

HPHERE was a cool silence. Bill
wondered what the horse-fish were
thinking, after all the trouble Thork
had made for them, and after all he had
pretended to be the champion of their
rights.

‘‘That ain’t all,” said Windy. “Here
comes Yellow-Z and the king now.”
While the aged white-haired old
spiny-man approached, the throngs rose
and waited respectfully.

“You got a surprise cornin’, Bea,”
Windy whispered. “You see, when
Thork fell an’ Bull’s-Eye was crouchin’
in the way, darned if the horse-fish’s
stabbers didn’t stick the old boy right
along the backbone.”

“We saw it happen,” said Vin, “and
it gave us an idea: If Thork’s inner
sentiments were transferred to Bull’s-
Eye, we could put the horse-fish into a
thought-phone and pick up Thork’s
dying thoughts. So we did.”

“An’ guess what — ”

But the king was entering the circle
now, and everyone was silent. Mari-
beau, the scientist, crowded close to
miss no detail of this impromptu cer-
emony. Windy’s eyes ran rings around
the breathless audience. Bea’s shoul-
der trembled against Bill’s arm.

“I have been asked to approve the
revelation,” said the king in a low
rumbling voice, “which one of the
horse-fish has made of Thork’s dying
Sentiments. Those sentiments, as
quoted to me are, ‘They mustn’t know
that Bea-Bea is not a spiny-girl. They

mustn’t know that I stole her from an
English family visiting above-—’ ”

“Did Thork say that?” Bea fairly
floated to her feet in astonishment.

“That, as caught by Bull’s-Eye,” said
the king, “was Thork’s secret thought
immediately after the mortal wound
struck him. And I must add—”

Bill could hear Bea’s heart pound-
ing.

. . that the lieutenant confided
this secret to me many years ago,” the
king said calmly. “It happened after
the drowning of one of our babies . . .
so I assure you, Bea, that you are not
a spiny-girl.”

Bea reeled, nearly fainting, as Bill
helped her gently to her seat. The
strangest of fires lighted her eyes, and
with burning amazement she looked
from Bill to Vin and back to Bill. A
curious smile touched the corners of
her lips, as if she were laughing inside.

“But perhaps,” the king added, after
he had turned to go, “we should insist
that you are a spiny-girl, since we’ve
raised you. That, however, I shall
leave with our mediator and new lieu-
tenant, Vin-Vin.”

The white haired king hobbled away.

Vin turned to Bea and Bill, smiling.
“Friends, my yacht and sailors are up
there — at your service. Will you come
back sometime?”

“Will we!” Bill said it enthusiasti-
cally. Then he turned to Bea. “Will
we?”

“We’ll think it over, Vin,” Bea
smiled. “After all that you and the
scientist have told us, we may want to
come — to live — for the benefit of our
descendants.”

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IN CENTER CITY

by ROBERT MOORE WILLIAMS

T HE mayor of Center City was a honor, the mayor, said. “I want you to
kind and humane man, always get off your can and do something about
thoughtful and always soft- this crime wave that the papers are
spoken. So when he spoke to the chief hollering about. I don’t want any ex-
of police about the crime wave that had cuses, see? X want something done and
broken over this city of churches, his you . . . well better do it. I got an
voice could not be heard beyond the election coming up. You get it?”
walls of his sound-proofed office. “Yes sir,” the chief of police said. “I

“Listen, you big tub of lard,” his understand, sir.”

These two coppers knew they
had a big-shot in custody. Mow Centex
City would be rid of its crime ring . .

But when their prisoner identified him-
self, he became a white elephant indeed!

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

“You damn well better understand,”
the mayor said. “Or there will be a
new chief of police in this town. And
I ain’t fooling!”

The chief of police was also a kind
and humane man. He took his depar-
ture from the office of the mayor and re-
turned to headquarters, where he called
his captains before him and spoke as
follows:

“Boys, I have been talking to the
mayor and he tells me the newspapers
are saying this town is a hot-bed of
vice, sin, and crime. Of course I know
that none of you read anything in the
papers except the pictures, so this is
news to you. Now I hate to ask you to
soil your lily-white hands with anything
as crude as work, but I do want to slip
you a tip — -if Center City ain’t cleaned
up by this time tomorrow night, there is
going to be some police captains pound-
ing beats in this town, and I don’t mean
anybody else but you. Boys,” the chief
said, “have I made myself clear?”

He had made himself clear. The cap-
tains went to speak to the sergeants.
Now it is not necessary, for the pur-
poses of this narrative, to report what
all the captains said to all the sergeants.
It is not even necessary to reveal what
Captain Gallagher, of the plainclothes
division, said to Sergeant G. B. (Give
’em the Boot) Buck. It is enough just
to mention that Captain Gallagher
spoke to Sergeant Buck.

Under normal circumstances, Ser-
geant Buck was not an unkind man.
He did not bite the ears off every drunk
that got thrown in the lock up. And
there were times when his own men,
every one of them ex boy scouts who
had won all their merit badges, could
enter his office charged with some tri-
fling offense, such as helping themselves
to an apple from the cart of a huckster,
and emerge without a single permanent
mark on their bodies.

Two of the men who worked for Ser-
geant Buck were Plainclothesmen
Grady and Waller. Both of them were
kindly men who loved their superior
officer and in turn were loved by him.
Of the conference between the mayor
and the chief, they knew nothing. Nor
did they know that the chief had con-
ferred with his captains and the cap-
tains in turn had conferred with the
sergeants. They knew, of course, that
a sudden and mysterious crime wave
had broken over Center City, but it was
none of their affair. It was Saturday
night and they were off duty. Crime
could wait. They were in the locker
room of police headquarters and their
attention was fully occupied by some-
thing far more important than crime.

“Here’s how,” said Grady.

“Mud in your eye,” Waller stated
firmly.

“Down the hatch,” Grady said again.

“Here’s to the mayor,” Waller said.

“Here’s to the chief,” Grady echoed.

AT THIS point they stopped for
breath. The bottle, a gift from a
kindly saloon keeper on Sixth Street
who sometimes stayed open after hours,
had been full when they started. It was
no longer full.

“Here’s to Sergeant Buck,” Waller
said, starting again.

“May he fall down a well and break
his blasted neck!” Grady fervently
echoed.

“Thank you, men, for your kind
wishes,” a voice said from the doorway.

To say that the two officers jumped
half out of their skins would be to un-
derstate the situation. They leaped.
Grady, with a sinuous motion that
would have interested a professional
contortionist, tried to get the bottle un-
der his coat. It was against the rules
to drink at headquarters. According to x
Scoutmaster Buck, it was against the

CRIME CLEAN-UP IN CENTER CITY

rules to drink anywhere. And it was
Buck who had spoken to them from the
doorway. Too often had they heard the
kindly sergeant speak in nightmares for
them ever to mistake his voice.

“Oh, helll” Grady gasped. “Here’s
where we catch it.”

Grady stood a flat six feet in his bare
feet and weighed a good two hundred
pounds. Waller was an inch shorter
and ten pounds heavier. The coach of
any professional football team would
have welcomed them with open arms.
When Sergeant Buck appeared in the
doorway each turned a sickly white.

“Ah,” said Buck, advancing into the
room. “Drinking, I see.”

“Y — -yes sir,” said Grady.

“N — no sir,” Waller denied.

Buck smiled fondly at Waller.

“I — mean yes sir,” Waller hastily
corrected himself.

Buck gazed fondly at both of them.
“Ah, well,” he said. “After all, it’s
Saturday night.” '

“Huh?” said Grady.

“I said it’s Saturday night,” Buck
patiently repeated.

“What’s that got to do with it?” Wal-
ler asked.

“I am aware that on Saturday night
some of my men wish to celebrate,”
Buck explained. “You were afraid I
was going to be harsh with you for
violating regulations by drinking at
headquarters, weren’t you?”

Waller nodded.

“Well, I’m not,” Buck said.

“You’re not — ” Waller choked. He
looked at Grady but got no comfort
from that source. Grady was standing
stiffly at attention. He had succeeded
in getting the bottle under his coat, all
but the neck, which was sticking
straight up.

“Not at all,” Buck continued. “I
am not even going to mention the mat-
ter, especially since you men have vol-

unteered for extra duty tonight”
Buck’s voice had exactly the same
patient tone of a scoutmaster saying,
“Men, it is wrong to pull the tails off
tadpoles. Good scouts do not do that.”

/"'RADY came to life. “Hey!” he
yelped.

“I ain’t volunteered,” W a 1 le r
shouted.

“We’re off duty, Sarge,” Grady pro-
tested.

“You mean you were off duty,” Buck
corrected. He cleared his throat. “For
your information, ,1 will reveal some
facts that may have escaped your at-
tention. First, there is a crime wave in
this fair city. Honest citizens are get-
ting their pockets picked. Ladies walk-
ing along the street are having their
purses snatched. Banks are getting held
up. Also,” Buck said, “new gambling
joints are springing up like mushrooms.
The school children are playing slot
machines and pin ball games, which are
to be found in every service station and
confectionery — ”

“I ain’t seen any slots,” Grady pro-
tested.

“If you will look in the newspapers,
you will see plenty of them,” Buck said.
“The papers say that some underworld
big shot has moved in on Center City.”

“Who is he?” Waller asked.

“That,” said Buck, “is another thing
the newspapers are asking. They asked
the mayor, in a front page editorial.
The mayor didn’t know. But he does
. know he’s got an election coming up, so
he asked the chief of police. The chief
don’t know, either, so he asked Captain
Gallagher. The captain came down
and asked me if I knew who this big
shot that has caused this crime wave
was. When I said I didn’t know, the
captain said maybe I had better find
out. So — ” Buck’s voice took on a
slightly acid tone, “the minute I saw

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

you two boys having a drink, I knew
yoti were going to volunteer for special
duty tonight to solve this crime wave.
And now,” the sergeant finished, “do I
hear you volunteering or do I hear my-
self slapping a fifty dollar fine on each
of you, for drinking at headquarters?”
The sergeant smiled. It was within
his power to fine the men under him for
infractions of regulations. He would
not hesitate to exercise that power.
“Look, Sarge — ” Grady wailed.
“We’re off duty,” Waller protested.
“We been on our feet all day and my
dogs are killing me. You’re not going
to send us out, are you?”

“In the first place,” Buck corrected,
“I’m not sending you out. You are
volunteering. And in the second place,
the mayor wants this crime wave solved,
the chief wants it solved, the captain
wants it solved. And so do I. Does
that mean anything to you?”

It meant something all right. It meant
that two plainclothes detectives might
suddenly move from a cushy spot at
headquarters back to a beat. It meant
that the same thing might happen to any
number of sergeants, several captains,
the chief himself. It meant the mayor
might no longer find himself in a posi-
tion to negotiate contracts for public
buildings, paving, et cetera. Detective
Waller was silent. He plainly perceived
the situation.

Not so Grady. He was rebellious.
“This is my night off,” he announced.
“I am not going to volunteer.”

Sergeant Buck perceived that he was
being defied. He didn’t mind. He
knew how to handle mutiny. “Seventy-
five dollars,” he said.

“Seventy-five! Huh?” Grady gulped.
“For drinking at headquarters,”
Buck explained.

“I volunteer!” said Waller hastily.
Grady began to sweat. He knew the
sergeant would enforce that fine. But

he was still mutinous. “I’m not going,”
he announced. “I don’t have to. You
can’t force a man to accept duty with-
out his consent.”

According to regulations, Grady was
quite right.

“One hundred dollars,” said Buck,
like an auctioneer selling an extra fine
batch of tobacco. “The regulations em-
power me to assess any fine I see fit.”

Grady’s lips began to work. But no
sound came forth. Buck, however,
could hear what hadn’t been said aloud.

“An additional twenty-five dollars,”
he said. “For swearing at your superior
officer.”

“All right!” Grady screamed. “I
volunteer.”

CHAPTER II
The Big Round-up

r T T HUS began what was to go down
A in the history of crime as “The Big
Round-up at Center City.” The scene
between Sergeant Buck and Plain-
clothesmen Grady and Waller was re-
peated in other places at headquarters
as various other sergeants, inspired by
the kindly words of their captains, went
down to reason with their men. The
men, detectives, uniformed patrolmen,
the rackets squad, the vice squads, the
bunco detail, the arson squad, even the
laboratory force, after listening to the
cheering, patriotic words spoken by
their fatherly sergeants, went forth into
the night resolved to do or die for dear
old Center City. They were also re-
solved to kick the teeth out of every
crook they could catch.

Of course the crook they wanted most
to catch was that mysterious and elusive
big shot who, moving in on Center City
a month or so previously, had brought
about this carnival of crime about
which the newspapers were so elo-
quently talking. His teeth they wanted

CRIME CLEAN-UP IN CENTER CITY

to kick down his throat, and then kick
back out again. But not knowing his
identity, they could only throw out a
general dragnet in the hope of catching
him. If they failed to land the big fish
they really wanted, they would certainly
land a horde of smaller fry, and by per-
suasion and reason the small fry could
no doubt be induced to leave town.
Thus Center City would again become
a fit place to rear children.

“We’ll get him,” the chief reported to
the mayor. “All the boys have agreed
to cooperate. By midnight we’ll have
every jack-leg crook run out of this
town, or my name ain’t McCarthy.”

The mayor, relying on this promise,
made a statement to the press. “I
want to extend an invitation to every
citizen and voter to be present at police
headquarters tonight and see for your-
selves the efficiency with which our
s noble boys in blue clean up this town.
The chief of police joins with me in this
invitation. We make you this promise :
that from tonight on, Center City will
be clean of crime.”

The press received this statement
with great reserve, but, of course,
printed it. The radio stations put it on
the air. The public, or as many of them
as could crowd into police headquarters,
took advantage of the mayor’s invita-
tion, so that by nine o’clock the police
station was crowded with a waiting
throng, eager to see the animals.

The animals began to arrive.

They came singing. The words were
different in each song but the tune was
the same. “You can’t do this to me. I
got protection. Wait until the Big Shot
hears about this.”

The panhandlers sang this song, the
confidence men sang it, as did the dis-
turbed girls from the red light district,
who added the information that they
were ladies.

“You better get this Big Shot,” the

mayor said grimly to the chief.

“We’ll get him,” the chief promised.
“I’ll issue an order to pick up every sus-
picious character in town.”

HpHE order came to Grady and Wal-
A ler, via radiotelephone, as they sat
morosely in a squad car on Sixth Street.

“We better make an arrest,” said
Grady.

“Don’t I know it?” Waller said
gloomily. “But where are we going to
find anybody to arrest? The boys have
been over this whole town with a fine
tooth comb. I ain’t even seen a pan-
handler in the last couple of hours.”

“It don’t make no difference,” Grady
said. “We got to drag somebody in.
From all that noise up at headquarters,
everybody on the force must have
caught at least one crook. We got to
catch somebody. Buck’ll have our hide
if we don’t.”

“You show me a crook and I’ll catch
him.”

“All right,” said Grady, pointing.
“There he is.”

A mild, inoffensive-appearing little
man was coming down the street. As
he neared the squad car he paused and
looked in the window of a pawn shop.

“He don’t look like a crook to me,”
Waller said doubtfully.

“What difference does that make?”
Grady said sarcastically. “He’s look-
ing in that pawn shop window, ain’t he?
That makes him a suspicious character,
don’t it? Maybe he’s going to throw a
rock through that window and grab
something and run, for all we know.
You talk like an old maid. Come on.”

The two detectives piled out of the
squad car. The little man saw them
coming. He took one look and shied
like a frightened horse.

“Help ! ” he bleated.

“He’s trying to run! ” Grady shouted.
“Don’t let him draw that gun. He’s

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

dangerous. Don’t give him a chance
to — ”

If the little man was trying to draw
a gun he must have been planning to
pluck it from the empty air. Both
hands were in plain sight. But, for all
Grady knew, maybe this little man was
a magician and could indeed pull a gun
out of nothing but air. The big cop
grabbed at him.

“Get away from me, you big bums,”
the little man shouted, shoving Grady.

“Hah ! ” Grady said gratefully. “Re-
sisting an officer. All right, bub, you
asked for it.”

Whether or not this suspicious char-
acter had asked for it, he got it. Grady’s
open palm smashed into the middle of
his face. As he staggered backward,
Waller, who had run around behind,
tripped him.

“Work him over,” Grady panted.
“We’ll show him to respect the law in
this town.”

Under normal circumstances, the two
officers would have dealt more gently
with a captive, ‘in accordance with the
boy scout code. But after their inter-
view with Sergeant Buck, they had for-
gotten all about the boy scout maxims,
“Kindness Pays,” and “Look Before
You Leap,” Grady especially.

r "pHE result was that fifteen minutes
A later a squad car with siren scream-
ing pulled up in front of police head-
quarters. From it descended Grady
and Waller, smiling broadly. The
watching throng cheered them as they
escorted their battered and somewhat
dazed captive up the steps. Flashlight
bulbs popped as the press recorded the
scene for posterity.

The prisoner sang the same tune all
the others had sung.

“You ruffians! You can’t do this to
me. I have influence in this commu-
nity.”

“Book him for loitering,” Grady told
the desk sergeant. “Also for attempted
robbery. He tried to break a pawnshop
window. Also you can put the bite on
him for resisting an officer.”

Sergeant Buck put in an appearance,
tagged by the chief and the mayor.
“Good work, huh, Sarge?” Grady said.
“We caught a dangerous character here.
Better have him printed and mugged.
He looks like he’s got a record to me.
Maybe we can have the rest of the night
off, huh, Sarge?” he finished.

Sergeant Buck started to say some-
thing but the words caught in his throat.
A deadly pallor crept across his face.

“What’s the matter, Sarge?” Grady
asked. “Ain’t you feeling well?”

“No,” Sergeant Buck whispered.
“No. I’m not.”

“That’s too bad,” Grady said sympa-
thetically. “Maybe you better take the
rest of the night off too?” How about
it, Chief?” he said, turning to the head
of the police department. “The Sarge
is sick. Maybe we all better knock off
now — ”

It was at this moment that Grady
perceived that the strange malady that
had afflicted Sergeant Buck had also
spread to the chief of police. The chief
looked like he had taken a big bite into
what appeared to be a very sound ap-
ple, and to his shocked surprise had en-
countered a worm. The chief looked
sick, and the mayor looked sicker.

A strange silence had fallen in the
room. Even the press, normally voci£-
rous, was silent. Grady saw the faces
of the reporters. They looked dazed,
slightly bewildered.

“What’s the matter?” Grady said.
“What’s wrong?”

It was the mayor who stepped for-
ward to make a brief formal statement.
“You ignorant fools,” the mayor said.
“I’ll tell you what’s the matter. That
man you have arrested is my brother.”

CRIME CLEAN-UP IN CENTER CITY

ppOR an instant the stunned silence
continued. Then it was broken as
press, whooping with joy, made a dash
to the telephones, where they could be
heard shouting headlines to happy re-
write men on the other end of the wire.

MAYOR’S BROTHER ARRESTED
AS COMMON THIEF
Two detectives, investigating a
suspicious character loitering on
Sixth Street tonight, caught the
brother of the mayor in the act of
breaking a pawnshop window. He
resisted arrest, but after a short
struggle was subdued and brought
to police headquarters, where he
was booked on charges of loitering,
attempted theft, and resisting an
officer in the discharge of his du-
ties.

So much the press reported in the
column devoted to news. In the edi-
torial department, however, pessimists
who had written for years about sin and
crime in the city, with no visible re-
sults, let themselves go in freer vein.

The long suspected connection
between the present administra-
tion and the crive wave afflicting
our fair city was brought to light
tonight by the arrest of the brother
of the mayor on charges of theft.
Thus, it is obvious that the mayor,
instead of trying to free our city
from the crime so common here, is
in reality harboring and protecting
the criminals, It is also obvious
that all right-thinking citizens,
with this evidence before their
eyes, will know how to mark their
ballots in the coming election.

On the back steps of police head-
quarters that night a conference took
place. It was short and to the point.

“How was we to know this guy was
the mayor’s brother?” Grady protested.

“Yeah, how was we to know?” Waller
added.

“How do I know the names of two
guys who will be in the breadline by this
time tomorrow night?” Sergeant Buck
said bitterly. “You 7 two miserable mis-
begotten

fool — ” The sergeant paused

for breath. “Get out of here. You
either bring back the big shot who is
responsible for this crime wave, or don’t
come - back yourselves. Get goin.”

With these kindly words of advice,
the sergeant dismissed them. And as
they turned to go, he kicked them down
the steps.

CHAPTER III
The Captive

'T'HUS it is obvious that all the blame
A for what happened later cannot
justly be laid on Grady and Waller.
They were harassed men. But for that
matter, the mayor was a harassed man,
as was the chief of police, and Sergeant
Buck.

At police headquarters, after the
identity of his brother was disclosed,
and after the press had steadfastly re-
fused to accept any explanation for
the incident, the mayor retired to the
office of the chief, taking the chief with
him. What was said there was never
disclosed but when the chief emerged
from the conference, it was observed
that he had aged remarkably, some said
five years, others ten. He was barely
able to speak.

“Boys,” he said to his assembled
.men, “you will either catch the big-time
crook who is back of this crime, wave,
or I will break your damned necks.”

Thus inspired, his men went forth
to battle. Among the criminal element,

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

times, already tough, took a quick turn
for the worse. It was a bad night for
crooks.

Again there was singing at police
headquarters. “You can’t do this to
me. I got protection. Wait until the
Big Shot hears about this.”

“CROOKS CLAIM PROTEC-
TION,” the newspaper headlines said.
Every paper in town was holding over
its staff and was turning out extras.

“There is no protection of criminals
in this city,” the mayor announced.

“What about your brother?” a criti-
cal reporter asked. “An ex-convict,
ain’t he? You’ve been protecting him,
ain’t you?”

It did the mayor no good to protest
that until the moment of his unfortu-
nate arrest, his brother had been a
deacon in the church and a Sunday
school teacher. “Mayor’s brother, ex-
convict, once taught Sunday school,”
the headlines said.

An hour passed. Squads were scour-
ing the town, with no results. “Every-
body has heard of this big shot but no-
body knows who he is,” the reports
came in.

“Get him,” the chief of .police said.

A NOTHER hour passed. By this
time the harassed officers of the
law, driven to desperation, were bring-
ing in honest citizens almost exclusively.
The crooks had all been caught, ac-
cording to the cops. They were ar-
resting everybody that looked as if he
might be guilty of thinking about com-
mitting a crime.

“Big Clean-Up Catches Only Hon-
est Citizens,” the newspapers said.

The mayor, mopping his face, retired
to the chief’s office. “I’m licked,” he
said. “The public will never forget
this.” He looked at the chief. The
chief turned pale.

“Beginning tomorrow morning,” the

mayor said. “You will be back pound-
ing a beat.” He was going to elaborate
on this statement but he was inter-
rupted. From the hallway outside a
calm voice said:

“Get on in there, you big lug, before
I knock your block off.”

Entranced, the mayor and the chief
went to the door. Moving between gap-
ing rows of spectators were two detec-
tives — the mayor winced at the sight of
them.

“Grady and Waller!” the chief
gasped. “But who’s that they’ve ar-
rested?”

“We got him,” Grady answered. “The
big-time crook that has been causing all
this trouble. We got him.”

Grady’s lips were puffed and his right
eye was already turning black. He
walked with a slight limp, but seemed
otherwise all right. He was very calm.

“Caught him with the goods,” Waller
supplied. “No doubt about it this time.
We got the evidence. He’s the big shot
all right.”

Waller’s nose was slightly out of line
and he was tenderly caressing the
knuckles of his left hand. He was also
very calm.

There was silence at headquarters.
Everyone was staring at their captive.
He was something to stare at. Built on
the generous lines of a gorilla, Gargun-
tia would have taken one look at him
and run to hide. He must have weighed
three hundred pounds, all of which was
muscle. Apparently he had no neck,
his head sitting squat on his shoulders.
His face, while not exactly ugly, would
do as a model until an ugly face came
along. The bruises on it didn’t help
its appearance any.

He was clad in a checkerboard suit
the alternate squares of which were
green and yellow. Obviously the suit
had been cut to fit him perfectly, once.
It no longer fitted perfectly. One sleeve

CRIME CLEAN-UP IN CENTER CITY

had been torn out of the coat and the
buttons had been jerked off the vest.

“tTE RESISTED arrest!” Grady ex-
plained.

“We caught him just opening up a
new gambling joint,” Waller added.

“Good work, men, good work,” the
mayor exulted. He was already vision-
ing headlines. “Mayor’s Clean-Up
Drive Succeeds.”

“Good work, men,” the chief said.
“Take him up to the desk and book him.
We’ll see that he is prosecuted to the
fullest extent of the law.”

“Get along, you,” Grady said. He
did not actually strike the prisoner —
there were too many witnesses present
— but he did contrive to shove him so
that the captive lost balance and fell.

“Ypuse mugs will pay for this!” he
snarled from the floor, in a surprising
show of spirit from one subject to the
tender mercies of the police. “Youse’ll
be in my book from now on.”

Threats frightened neither Grady nor
Waller. Men who had faced Sergeant
Buck seldom feared anything that
walked the earth.

“Get up,” said Grady, smartly kick-
ing the prisoner in the rear.

As they led their captive up to the
desk, Grady and Waller could see ad-
miration on the faces of the reporters
surrounding them. They glowed. Vic-
tory had been hard-won, but victory was
their’s. To them the laurel wreath!

“Name?” the desk sergeant said,
glowering at the sullen prisoner.

There was no answer.

“Tell the sergeant your name,”
Grady said, cuffing him on the side of
the head.

This produced results.

“Satan,” the prisoner muttered.

“Satan what?” the desk sergeant
automatically asked, his pen poised as
he prepared to write.

“Just Satan!” the prisoner snarled in
a gutteral tone of voice. “Ain’t that
enough for youse? Just Satan.”

For a space of time that must have
lasted minutes the desk sergeant held
his pen poised in the air while his
startled eyes traveled over the captive
before him. Then his face began to jerk
as he realized the meaning of the words
he had heard. “You — you mean — ” he
quavered.

“Satan!” the prisoner shouted. “I
come up here to get this town organized
and these two mugs grab me. Satan’s
my name. How long is it going to take
for you to get it through your thick
heads that Vm the devil?”

Again there was silence at head-
quarters, complete silence. Wi^h an
air of utter abstraction the desk ser-
geant put the point of the pen between
his lips to moisten it. Then he put it
down. Behind him was a wall with a
window in it. He took one final, hor-
rified look at the prisoner before him
and leaped straight through the window.
He was shouting:

“Great saints in heaven, the boys
have brought in the devil himself! ”

npHE tinkle of falling glass from the
broken window had no more than
died into silence before the public,
which had jammed and crammed the
corridors of headquarters, began to
make a general exodus. Some people
walked to the nearest exit; others ran.
Still others, noting with approval the
action of the desk sergeant, went
through the windows.

The people had come to headquarters
to witness a roundup of crooks. They
had not known that the leader of these
crooks was the devil and they had not
expected to see him. They had not seen
the devil before, and after one look,
they did not want to see him again.
Consequently, they left.

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

The mayor, after all, was one of the
people. He started to leave, but when
flashlight bulbs began to pop, he was
forced to change his mind. As long as
the press stayed, he would have to stay.
As long as the mayor stayed, the chief
would have to remain, and while the
chief was there, the police force would
not depart.

It is highly likely that at least two
members of the police force would have
left headquarters if they had been able
to move their legs. But for the space of
several seconds Grady and Waller were
completely paralyzed and when the
paralysis left them and they started to
run, it was too late.

“Lock him in a cell,” a voice said.
“Huh?” Grady gasped, looking
around.

It was Sergeant Buck who had
spoken. The sergeant was calmly sur-
veying the situation.

“You — you mean — lock him up?”
Grady whispered. “But he’s the devil,
he’s Old Nick himself.”

“So I heard,” Sergeant Buck an-
swered imperturbably. “Lock him up.”
“But — but he’s the devil.”

“Yes,” came the answer. “And I am
Sergeant Buck. The chief is watching
me and the mayor is watching the chief
and the newspapers are watching the
mayor. Now do you want to lock him
up, or don’t you?”

There was only one answer to that
question. They locked him up.

CHAPTER IV

The Dilemma

'"pHE press promptly beseiged the
A cell.

“Are you really the devil?” a re-
porter demanded.

“Sure I am,” the prompt answer
came.

The press, true to its traditions of not
believing half the things it saw, was
incredulous.

“I don’t believe it.”

“You’re faking.”

“The devil has hoofs and horns and
tail. You don’t. Where’s your tail,
where’s your horns? We think you’re
lying.”

The occupant of the cell was not in
a good humor anyhow. This accusa-
tion enraged him. “So you don’t be-
lieve I’m the devil, huh?” he shouted
“Well, I’ll just show you.”

With this, he began jerking off his
clothes. He had a fine head of curly
red hair. This was a wig. He jerked
it off, revealing a bald head ornamented
with unmistakable horns. The suit came
off next. When the last garment had
been angrily flung against the bars, the
devil stood stark naked.

The press, gazing upon this spectacle,
was no longer incredulous. The occu-
pant of the cell had hooves all right.
He stamped them against the stone
floor. Sparks flew. He also had a tail,
which terminated in a horny point.
Thrusting the tail between the bars, he
jabbed a reporter in the leg.

“E-yowl” .shouted this representa-
tive of the press.

“Ivguess that shows you smart guys
something,” the devil said, in a satis-
fied tone of voice.

Grady and Waller witnessed this
scene from a little distance. Grady was
perspiring freely and Waller had a de-
cidedly thoughtful look on his face.
Sergeant Buck was with them.

“You know what?” Grady said
hesitantly.

“Yeah,” Waller said. “ been think-
ing the same thing. He said you and
me were going down in his book.”

Grady shuddered.

“Don’t let that bother you, boys,”
Sergeant Buck said. “You did a good

CRIME CLEAN-UP IN CENTER CITY

job. The force will stand back of you.”

“It ain’t somebody to stand back of
me that I want,” Grady answered. “It’s
somebody to stand in front of me.”

It had suddenly occurred to Grady
that he might spend the rest of his life
dodging a revenge-seeking devil. This
was not a comforting thought.

“You boys caught the devil all right,”
Sergeant Buck said. “But the thing that
is worrying me is — what are we going,
to do with him?’’

Almost simultaneously the same idea
occurred to the chastened press. The
reporters went immediately, to the foun-
tain of all knowledge, and put the ques-
tion to him.

pOR once in his life the mayor was
1 struck dumb. Until that moment
he had been making a speech, to which
no one was listening, to the effect that
the police department, under his ad-
ministration, “Has become so efficient
that it can catch the devil himself.”

“All right, you’ve caught him,” a re-
porter said. “But what are you going
to do with him now that you’ve got
him?”

“I — uh — we — that is — .” His Honor
floundered. He immediately perceived
that this problem had more angles than
he had thought. It was one thing to
catch the devil. It was quite another
thing to decide what to do with him.
The mayor didn’t know the answer. He
turned to the chief of police. The
chief shook his head.

“Here they come down our street,”
said Grady bitterly, seeing what was
going to happen.

It happened. The chief asked Cap-
tain Gallagher and the captain asked
Sergeant Buck.

“I don’t know what the hell we’re
going to do with him ! ” Grady shouted
at the Sergeant. “We just caught him.
It’s up to you big shots to decide what

to do about him. I only work here.”

“You might hang him,” the reporter
who had been jabbed in the leg sug-
gested. “He’s guilty enough to be hung
a thousand times over.”

The occupant of the cell overhead
this suggestion.

“I’d like to see you mugs try to hang
me!” he shouted. “It wouldn’t work,
of course; the rope would break and the
scaffold would fall down and a lot of
other things would happen. But I’d like
to see you try it,” he ended, blowing
smoke and yellow flames out of his
mouth.

“I don’t — ah — believe we will hang
him,” the mayor said nervously. “Is
that burning brimstone I smell?”

“I ain’t nothing else but brimstone,”
the devil answered.

“How about shooting him?” a detec-
tive asked.

The devil snorted in derision. “You
point a gun at me it won’t go off. Also,”
he added, “I would hate to be in the
shoes of any guy who does try to take
a shot at me.”

The idea of shooting their captive
was promptly dropped. “We of course
can’t shoot him,” the mayor quickly
said. “That would be against the law.”

“Well, what are you going to do with
him?” the press demanded.

“I’m just waitin’ for you mugs to try
to do anything with me I" the devil
shouted from his cell. “I got powers I
ain’t been using yet. I’m waiting to see
how far you will go. The minute you
go too far, I’m going to start kicking
this joint apart. There won’t be one
stone left on top of another when I get
through.”

He emphasized this statement by
kicking the bars of his cell. The bars,
an inch in diameter, were made of
honest steel. But with no apparent ef-
fort, using only his bare hoof, the devil
kicked two of them out.

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

“How do you like that?” he asked.
“That’s only a sample of what I can do
when I get really mad. And,” he ended,
“I’m getting pretty mad now.”

JP'ROM bulging eyes the mayor stared
at the broken bars. He wiped his
forehead. “I — ah — feel a sudden ill-
ness,” he said to the chief of police. “I
-—ah leave this matter entirely in your
hands. Both I, and the voters of this
fair city, will expect a satisfactory con-
clusion to it. Now I — ah — due to this
sudden illness that has overtaken me
— am going home.”

With that, the mayor departed. He
was going home. Catching crooks, he
felt, was the duty of the police. Dis-
posing of them after they were caught
was also within the province of the
police department.

The chief stared wildly around him.
“Well, what are you going to do?”
a reporter asked.

“A conference,” the chief said. “I’m
going to call a conference. I want all
the captains to come to my office, im-
mediately, to confer with me.”

The press would gladly have sat in
on that conference but the door was
slammed in their face.

Grady stared ominously at the closed
door. “I got a feeling I know what’s
going to happen,” he said.

Five minutes later the door opened
and the captains emerged. Captain
Gallagher, of the plainclothes squad,
same straight to Sergeant Buck. “The
chief has had a sudden heart attack,”
Captain Gallagher said. “He’s gone
home. He went out the side door.”
The captain paused and looked at the
floor. “I feel kind of like I might have
a heart attack coming on myself,” he
said. “So I’m leaving everything to
you, Sergeant. I’m sure you will be
able to handle this matter.”

Captain Gallagher at least had the

grace to look ashamed of himself. But
ashamed or not, with one last startled
look at those broken bars, he left.

“I knew it,” Grady said bitterly.
“Everybody’s going home but us.”

Sergeant Buck did not even bother
to look ashamed. “Under the circum-
stances,” he said to his two men. “I am
going to leave this matter in your
hands.”

“But — ” Grady started to protest.

“You caught him,” said Sergeant
Buck. “You damned well have got to
decide what to do with him, and do it.
I might mention that, if you don’t solve
this problem, you will have to settle
with me.”

With these grim words, Sergeant
Buck joined the general exodus of the
homeward bound.

T~\ETECTIVE Waller was a man who
could get an idea. “I rank you,”
he said, edging toward the door. “I’ve
been in the service longer than you have
and I rank you — ”

“No,” said Grady, reaching out and
grabbing Waller by the collar. “You
stay.”

Waller stayed. The press also stayed,
demanding to know what jvas going to
be done.

“Well,” said Grady. “There’s one
thing that ain’t, been tried.”

“What’s that?” a reporter asked.

“I’m not telling,” Grady said. Nor
would he give the nervous reporters a
single hint of his plan. Instead he went
to the locker room, and returning in a
few minutes, stalked straight to the
door of the cell in which the devil was
incarcerated.

The reporters watched him. He took
a key out of his pocket and inserted it
in the lock.

“Are you going to open that door?”
a reporter demanded.

“I am,” Grady answered, turning

CRIME CLEAN-UP IN CENTER CITY

the key determinedly in the lock.

Up to this point the press had been
brave to the point of foolhardiness. The
reporters had badgered the mayor, the
chief, the police in general, and even the
devil himself, through the bars. But
the instant Grady turned the key in the
lock, the press, to a man, departed from
the building. The repair department
spent the next week putting a new door
on the front entrance, so hurriedly did
the press depart.

“They didn’t think it was a good
idea to unlock this cell,” said Waller,
nervously watching the press depart.

“It may not be,” said Grady. “But
I’m going to open it.”

At his tug the heavy grill slid aside.

“Come on out,” he said to the oc-
cupant of the cell.

HPHE devil stood there. He was exud-
A ing a powerful odor of brimstone
and his tail was swishing through the
air with a sound like a scythe cutting
through grass. There was surprise on
his face as he looked at Grady and
Waller.

“What are you two thugs up to
now?” he demanded.

Grady wiped sweat from his face.

“You’re the two strong arm boys who
worked me over and brought me in,
ain’t you?” the devil demanded, star-
ing at them.

“That,” said Grady, “is right. And
for that, I now wish to apologize.”

“Huh?” The devil was startled.

“We had been kicked around some
ourselves,” the detective explained. “So
when you showed fight, we naturally
worked you over a little. All we can say
is we are sorry it happened and it won’t
happen again.”

“Well I’m damned!” the devil
gasped.

“I can’t say about that,” Grady an-
swered. “But if you are willing to let

bygones be bygones, we are certainly
willing to do the same. We are. also will-
ing to turn you loose and let you go to
hell in peace.” That is,” he added
quickly, “if hell is where you want to
go.”

“Great demons!” the devil gasped.
“Do you really mean it?”

“We certainly do,” Grady answered
firmly. “And to show our good faith
— ” He fumbled in his coat and brought
out a bottle — the same bottle that Ser-
geant Buck had caught them sampling
earlier in the evening. “Here,” he
finished, thrusting the bottle toward the
devil. “Have a drink.”

For a minute the devil seemed doubt-
ful. Smoke in twin jets continued to
puff from his nostrils. Then the smoke
began to diminish. A broad grin ap-
peared on his face.

“I don’t mind if I do,” he said, reach-
ing for the bottle. Taking a long drink,
he gazed fondly at the detectives. “This
is the first time anything like this has
happened to me in centuries. I’m not
really a bad guy,” he continued, “but
you humans have kicked me around so
long that I’ve had to fight back. The
result id, I’ve got a bad reputation.”
“Yes sir,” said Grady, still perspir-
ing. “You sure have. And now,” he
continued, “are you willing to go back
to hell and leave Center City alone?”
“Sure,” the devil promptly answered.
“Anybody that treats me half way right
can be certain they will be treated right
in return. I don’t mind admitting that
I was about ready to tear this town
apart. But since you fellows have
treated me right, I’ll call my boys off
and we’ll leave Center City alone in
the future. Do you mind,” he ended,
“if I take this bottle along with me?”
“Not at all,” said Grady fervently.
“Not at all. If you will just wait until
I can raid the chiefs locker, I’ll get you
a whole case.”

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

“By golly 1” said the devil, grinning
from ear to ear. “You sure are fine
fellows. Sure, I’ll wait.”

Five minutes later, with the case un-
der one arm, in a flash of fire and brim-
stone, he vanished.

“Great jumping demons!” Waller
gasped, gazing in awe at his companion.
“How did you figure out what to do?”
“We had tried everything but kind-
ness,” Grady said sentimentally. “So 3
thought I’d try that. Poor devil I No-
body had been nice to him in centuries
and he was so surprised he hardly knew
what to do. Kindness,” he ended,
“whether used on dumb animals or the
devil, certainly pays.”

npHUS the story ends. It is interest-
A ing to note, however, that the
chastened and rather frightened press,
in reporting this matter, agreed that it
would not be wise to mention the
presence of the devil in Center City.
It would not be good business. Conse-
quently the papers reported, in broad
headlines, that the mayor’s clean-up
campaign was a complete success and
that Center City was now a fit place
to rear children. The papers also sup-
ported the mayor’s campaign for re-

election, which terminated satisfactori-
ly. The crime wave in Center City, the
papers admitted, was not the fault of
the mayor.

It is also interesting to note, when the
various interested parties were fully in-
formed of the method by which the
devil had been induced to leave Center
City, that a new spirit immediately ap-
peared in the community. Whereas in
the past lawbreakers had been most
harshly dealt with, and honest citizens
parking fifteen minutes overtime, had
been sternly reproved, now the rare
violator of the law was treated with
such extraordinary Irindness that he
was ashamed of himself. And if a
citizen should park by a fire plug, the
cop on the beat did not snarl at him,
but moved the car himself. Kindness,
in Center City, is being worked over-
time, and even those ex-boy scouts on
the police force, Sergeant Buck, Grady,
and Waller — the last two receiving pro-
motions as a result of their part in the
affair of the devil — are now known for
their courtesy and helpfulness. By those
who knew them in the sad old days of
sin, this is regarded as a modern
miracle.

THE END

(Continued from page 6)

YKJ E think, or rather we know, the author who
* ' has made the greatest impression on you all
at rare intervals with his delightful and unusual
short stories, is Robert Bloch, the sage of Mil-
waukee. Well, we have him once more, in this
issue, with a real rib-tickler. It’s “Time Wounds
All Heels”. The title alone will give you a slight
idea of what’s in store for you.

/^\NCE upon a time we ran two stories in an
^ issue by Nelson S. Bond. Heresy, said other
authors. Usually editor* conceal such perfidy
under a pen-name, which supposedly, makes it
all right. But what’s wrong, say we, with run-
ning two stories in an issue by one writer? If a
writer can occasionally turn out two masterpieces

in one month, who are we to hide it under a
smoke screen? So that’s why you’ll find Don
Wilcox with us twice this month. “Bull Moose
Of Babylon” is a story that reminds us of A.
Merritt’s “The Ship Of Ishtar”, perhaps because
it is so different. But it has a new, sweeping
flavor to it that strikes us just as Merritt’s famous
tale did the first time we read it. And we
predict that many of you will read this fantastic
tale of Babylon over in years to come, and de-
light in it again.

'T'ALK about characters! Here’s Oscar, the
* little Martian detective returning I James Nor-
man, now reaching fame as a novelist with his
“Murder, Chop Chop”, has given us another one
about the little fellow. And in it, the nasty
Japs get what’s coining to ’em, bless his little
Martian science! Incidentally, the idea behind
this story is based on truth itself, and scientifically,
it would be entirely possible to change the cli-
mate of our country in just such a manner as
Oscar so adroitly foils.

THE EDITOR’S NOTEBOOK

DUT enough of the contents of this issue. We’ll
. leave a few of the many other treats to your
own discovery. Just browse through this giant
issue and enjoy it. We’ve made sure that there’s
not a story in it that won't ring bells all over the
place. My, how we like to brag — but my how
proud we are of this issue; and can you. blame
us?

AFTER a long time, we finally present to you
^ Mr. Virgil Finlay, with not one, but two
illustrations in this issue. And you can bet he'll
be back with us regularly from now on. In
fact, he’s got a standing order to create lovely
drawings, even if we have no story in mind. Our
authors have taken to our cover-inspiration policy
so well that they have suggested interior illus-
trations will serve the same purpose. We’ve
already done it once — in the case of Magarian,
who sold us one of his “samples”. The final
result was a story called “Mademoiselle Butter-
fly” which you’ll be seeing in these pages next
month.

D IGHT about here it seems appropriate that
we announce the impending birth of a new
member of the Ziff-Davis pulp magazine family.
It is Mammoth Detective, planned to lead the de-
tective field just as Amazing Stories and Fantastic
Adventures lead the science fiction and fantasy
fields respectively. Which ought to be enough for
you among our readers who also enjoy good de-
tective fiction. Watch for the date of its ap-
pearance. You won’t want to miss it.

p ECENTLY we visited New York. Editorially,
it was a fine trip, because we met such
authors as David V. Reed, John Broome, Eando
Binder, Alfred Bester, Arthur T. Harris, and
many others. And the result will be many fine
stories for you readers. It seems even on a vaca-
tion, we can’t resist digging up good things for
you.

However, we have a personal grudge against
those two screwball authors, William P. McGivem
and David Wright O’Brien. Hearing that we were
leaving for the big city, they saw us off. Skip-
ping the details, which included singing a lusty
trio about the sidewalks of a certain city, in a
crowded railroad station, we finally regained con-
sciousness to discover that the interval between
Chicago and Cleveland was a blank. We, upon
our honor, hereby promise that someday, some-
how, we will pour those two very good authors
onto a train to some ungodly place far from no-
where, and chuckle with glee over their plight
when they awoke.

A FEW personal bits about Nerw York and
those authors: David V. Reed recently sold
us a novel (of which you’ll certainly hear more
in the near future) and promptly bought a new
radio and record player. A very grand affair, to be

sure, and knowing your editor’s liking for music, he
had many of our favorite recordings ready, and
we certainly enjoyed them. But his pretty wife
confided that she wanted a new rug for the
living room floor. Which probably means Dave
will be writing at least a long novelet for us
soon.

However, we saw a model of a U. S. destroyer
which Reed made, and considering the writing
time he spent on it, its value is around $400.00.
He advised us to get a hobby for ourselves. Well,
we have one. A big issue like this is plenty hobby
for us!

JULIUS SCHWARTZ, author and agent, can-
not take it. Champagne i^ his nemesis. Your
editor saw him put to bed long before the New
Year rang its lusty and portentious way in. In-
cidentally, Julius is responsible for those fine
stories by such authors as Wellman, Bester, Ayre,
Feam, Cross, Broome, etc., etc. It is his guidance
that results in many of the treats we present to
you.

'T'HE Nelson S. Bonds are celebrating the ar-
-*• rival of an heir. A howling success of a son,
who will one day become a faithful Fantastic
Adventures reader, promises his dad. And the
little fellow arrived as the New Year was only
35 minutes old!

TTOW did we manage to neglect mentioning
that there were two new authors in this
issue? Besides Harold Lawlor, we have Gerald
Vance, with, an odd little story about a schizo-
phrenic — a person with two separate and distinct
egos. We think you’ll like Mr. Vance, and we
hope he’ll be back again in the future.

TT. w. McCAULEY has just finished a new

■*- Mac Girl painting which strikes us as one
of the finest he’s ever done. For you readers
who have wanted a real “class” cover, this is if.
It has an elegance that none of his other paintings
have had, and the Mac Girl — boy-oh-boy! No
need to say any more about her.

Incidentally, why don’t you write Mac a letter
and give him some suggestions on what the Mac
Girl ought to do next? He’d welcome your
ideas, we’re sure. We’ll pass on any letters you
address to him, care of this magazine.

D IGHT at the present moment we can’t think
^ of any suitable fantastic dimension to which
we could transfer the island of Japan. It would
be a dirty trick on said dimension if it happened
to be inhabited by decent folks!

CO with that, we’ll close our notebook for this
^ month. Keep ’em flying, thumbs up, remem-
ber Pearl Harbor, and keep your shirts on, Hitler
and Mussolini — we’H get to you in due time!

RAP

Buff Moose of

1>U 2 X?

The time- transfer machine deposited them
on a Babylonian battlefield 2500 years ago

FELT trouble in my bones when I flew to Denver in answer to
Colonel Jason Milholland’s wire. His mention of a time-transfer
device should have been warning enough. But I plunged, like
a fool, and came up gasping for air in a sand-blown battlefield just
twenty-five hundred years before my time.

Ten minutes after I had convinced Milholland that my improved
vocoder would analyze animal voices, modern or ancient— -ten seconds

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

after I had nodded my agreement to
his outrageous proposition, I was biffed
across the head by an ancient Persian
soldier.

That’s how quick it happened.

One moment I was standing on the
Colonel’s roof porch surrounded by the
glories of the Rockies; then the big red
cylinder swished down out of nowhere,
like a series of neon hoops, to enclose
me, and the next instant I was skidding
down a sandy incline that wasn’t a golf
hazard, and the desert dust and battle
din was all around me. I hugged my
precious black case and slid for the bot-
tom of the ravine.

That was when the wild-eyed soldier,
dashed past me, flashing and steaming
in his metal armor, and whammed me
—accidentally, but none the less po-
tently — across the head with the handle
of his spear.

“Wa-ha-kik-log!” he was yelling,
and he must have been brass inside as
well as out. He didn’t stop to notice
me. He was charging into the fray,
along with a few thousand other mad
men.

“Wa-ha-kik-log 1”

Such voices 1 If Colonel Milholland
wanted a complete collection of the bel-
lows of beasts, he should have had
these.

But there was no time to operate my
vocoder amid this chaos. My first duty
to mankind was to avoid being tramped
to death. Already my new hunting
togs were being torn to shreds. I rolled
into a knot and hugged the hot sand
and let the stampede hurdle past. But

“The breeding season begins in Septem-
ber, and mating goes on through the fall.
At this season the bulls lose their natural
timidity, become savage, and will readily
attack any animal or even man, if their
rage is aroused.” — From the New Inter-
national Encyclopedia description of the
moose . — “Bull Moose of Babylon

some clumsy heavyweight came pound-
ing along, dragging his feet, and kicked
the daylights out of me.

When I came to, after hours of black-
out, I was not in a downy hospital bed,
and no kindly doctor was bending over
me. My first impression was that my
scalp had been carved in strips, that I
had been hung on a hook by a segment
of hide just above my right ear, that
someone was striking the hook with a
maul at regular intervals.

This impression underwent a slight
modification as consciousness came
clearer. I was actually walking on my
two feet, along with some five hundred
other ragged and battered prisoners of
war, and my scalp was cut, not with
any geometric precision, but rather in
the style that a blind man with a meat
cleaver might achieve.

I was still hanging onto the little
black case, however. And I managed
to cling to it through the unprintable
year and a half that followed.

/^\F THOSE hectic eighteen months
of imprisonment and slavery all I
need say is that I gradually became ac-
customed to my fate. I had no power
to take myself back to the twentieth
century. Evidently Colonel Milholland
had lost his power to bring me back. I
was stuck.

During that year and a half I had
learned a lot of ancient language, but
I detested having to use it. My roots
were in the twentieth century. I
couldn’t reconcile myself to starting life
over — in an age that was past and gone.

Then one day, while on the block
with seventy other bedraggled assorted
prisoners waiting to be sold, I noticed
that one of my fellow unfortunates was
eyeing me curiously. We fell into
casual conversation, as casual as pos-
sible against the auctioneer’s insulting
blather about our respective worths in

BULL MOOSE OF BABYLON

shekels.

“My name is Slaf-Carch,” said the
man, smiling toothlessly through his
steel wool whiskers. His voice was
resonant. “I have seen members of
your race before. You are from a for-
eign land.’'

“And a foreign time,” I said, not ex-
pecting him to make anything of it.

His twinkling eyes fairly snapped at
me. “You are the third,” he said, “who
has made that claim.”

“The third what V*

“The third invader from a foreign
land and time. > You have the same deli-
cate dialect as the other two. That is
what caught my attention. Do you
have a foreign name?”

“My name is Hal Norton,” I said.
“Where are these other two you speak
of?” Suspicions whipped through my
mind. Had Colonel Milholland sent
other twentieth-century envoys back to
this age? I remembered having tried
to probe Milholland on this, but he
had evaded me.

“One was killed under the wheel of
an Assyrian chariot,” said Slaf-Carch,
stroking his bronzed bald head reminis-
cently. “The other is still my slave.”

“ Your slave?” This struck me as be-
ing more than curious, since Slaf-Carch
himself was at this moment being sold
as a slave. Undoubtedly this grizzly-
s whiskered man 'had seen better days,
before some captor had knocked his
teeth out.

The same nomad prince who bought
Slaf-Carch began bidding on me, and
an hour later, bought and paid for, we
were tramping along the rugged foot-
hills of the Fertile Crescent.

“You spoke of a slave with a dialect
similar to mine,” I resumed, trudging
along beside Slaf-Carch. “What was
his name?”

“Her name,” Slaf-Carch corrected,
“and a very odd name it is: Betty”

There wasn’t breath enough in me to
comment. I needed to sit down and
think this matter over, but the nomad
prince and his guards had other ideas.
We hiked on through the evening heat.

Obviously I wasn’t the only victim of
Milholland’s time-trap. He had em-
ployed two other innocents in the
service of his hare-brained hobby — one
of them a girl. What price the voices
of ancient animals I

“Does your Betty carry a black case
like this?” I asked, indicating the voco-
der.

Slaf-Carch knew nothing of any
magic boxes. He probably would have
been too superstitious to investigate,
anyway. But he gave me other bits of
information, enough to prove my as-
sumptions. Both of my predecessors
had demonstrated a strange interest in
animals — an interest that had soon
waned.

npHAT night, long after the other
A slaves were asleep, Slaf-Carch and
I were still talking. The red glow from
the low fires gave his face intense
lines. “I am eager to get back. If
these nomads take us farther south,
they shall lose us. We will escape.”

“Where does this slave, Betty, live?”
I asked.

“At my mansion, in a village beyond
Babylon, where I should be fulfilling
my duties as the patesi,” he said. “By
this time, many business matters will
have gone undone. As for Betty, this
autumn I must give her separate quar-*
ters along with my older women slaves
so she can begin bearing slave chil-
dren.”

“Just a minute, pal,” I blurted in
English, then caught myself. In
Babylonian I said pointedly, ffI Take my
word for it, if Betty came from my land
you can cancel that plan.”

“You do not know our ways, Hal,”

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

he replied. “Betty has seen more of
Babylon than you.”

I didn’t deny this. But it was as un-
comfortable to swallow as a baseball.
This girl might have had the hard luck
to be stranded here and forced into the
Babylonian slave system. But that
didn’t mean she would desert all her
own twentieth-century ideals and senti-
ments. If she had the good American
spunk to fight this ancient balderdash,
I would fight with her; if she didn’t, I
hoped I would never meet her — in spite
of being starved for some twentieth-
century conversation.

SJaf-Carch sketched a picture in the
sand to show me how beautiful Betty
was. I couldn’t make anything out of
it, but the fire in his eyes conveyed a
strong impression.

“Let her go her own way,” I said
shortly. “I’ll go mine.”

Slaf-Carch wanted to know what my
way was. What, did I do back home,
and what did I expect to do here?

His questions stirred me to the
depths. It was the first time any fel-
low-slave had talked in terms of pur-
poses. I answered proudly that I, too,
was a man of vast importance in my
own land and time, and had no doubt
been sorely missed. I had planned to
help analyze radio voices, using my
vocoder — a matter which he wouldn’t
understand — when my sudden time-
transfer set my life back. No doubt my
own civilization had simply marked
time since my absence.

I snapped on a vocoder switch while
we talked, thinking to demonstrate how
easily I could break Slaf-Carch’s voice
into its separate parts — pitch, reso-
nance, volume, and consonant qualities.
But in deference to his superstitions I
snapped the thing off without showing
him the results.

Meanwhile, the old grizzle-beard
speculated futilely upon my chances to

return to my native country.

“If we can break free and reach
Babylon, then I may be able to help you
back to your land and time,” he offered
hopefully. “I have wealth. My
nephew, Jipfur, is also quite rich.”

I shook my head, tried to explain.
But the time element was a stumbler for
him. He looked blankly and fell to
drawing another sand sketch of his
Betty.

JJTOWEVER, these thoughts were no
passing fancies with him. He per-
sisted in digging into my history. I told
him of my agreement to make a study
of the voices of ancient animals; my
arrival in the midst of battle; the stam-
pede of Persian infantry, my months
of slavery, my fights to hold on to my
magic box — which was left to me only
because its black color threw a super-
stitious scare into my captors. Those
things he could understand much bet-
ter than my burning desire for a bath,
a shave, some Palm Beach clothes, a
quarter ton of Neapolitan ice cream,
and, most of all, a sudden lift back into
my own century.

“Your trouble,” he counselled, “is
that you are refusing to accept your
real situation.”

“I don’t want to accept it!” I said
so loudly that one of the guards snapped
his fingers at me. “I want to get out of
it.”

“Never hope to be lifted bodily out of
trouble,” Slaf-Carch said. “Things
don’t happen that way. I know. And
I am much older than you.”

I was tempted to challenge this state-
ment, but he continued:

“Dig your hands into the soil of the
hour, wherever you are, and claw
through your own troubles.”

“No more philosophy, please,” I pro-
tested. “I’ve been on a diet of it for
eighteen months. If you could offer me

BULL MOOSE OF BABYLON

a candy bar — ”

“Take the lion by the mane,” he said
sagely. "If your task is studying ani-
mals — ”

“No animals, please,” I said. “I’ve
lost ninety-eight percent of my respect
for the man who set me on that wild
goose chase — or rather, moose chase.”

“Then you must find other pastimes.
The slaves are treated decently enough
in this valley. They have a few hours
each day to themselves. Besides, they
need something to think about while
they lift water at the shaditf. Some-
thing besides revolt."

“What do you think about while you
are a slave?” I asked.

“Betty,” he replied, none too stoi-
cally.

CHAPTER II

/'NNE night two weeks later we were
v attacked by a band of cavalrymen,

"Babylonians!” Slaf-Carch hissed in
my ear. “Our chance!”

We slaves fled back into the darkness,
out of reach of the swords and ares.
When the fight grew hot we dodged into
the leaping shadows and did our bit
throwing stones. I'll never forget the
smell of that desert dawn, nor the sight
of flashing knives and falling beads.
Sunlight showed our camp a shambles.

The Babylonian cavalrymen won the
fray, in the end, so we slaves were in
fair enough luck. If the nomads had
won they’d have cut us to bits for help-
ing the attackers. As matters had
fumed, we had earned a reward — the
right to be slaves for the Babylonians.

Of course, those among us who were
Babylonians and not foreigners were
in double luck, for they were free.

But no one was so lucky as Slaf-
Carch. By a rare chance, this war
party had been sent out by bis own
nephew, the rich young palesi of Baby-

lon — Jipfur.

We traveled all night, and those of us
on foot were near exhaustion by dawn.
Then patches of reflected sunlight ap-
peared on the distant desert horizon to
quicken our pace. Those sharp little
rettangles grew before our eyes during
the hours of travel that followed. For
they were the buildings of Babylon,
their glazed tile walls gleaming like mir-
rors.

The glorious Babylon of Nebuchad-
nezzar 1 What a thrill for a wanderer
from the machine-age! Speaking of
machines, I craved one as never before
— preferably a motorcar or an airplane.
My legs threatened to fold up with
every step.

That afternoon summer clouds floated
over the city, reducing Babylon’s glar-
ing colors to pastel blues, yellows, lav-
enders. The city walls spread wide
along the Euphrates, the palaces reared
high, and a great multi-storied liggurat
towered into the clouds. No twentieth
century skyline was ever more breath-
taking. As a matter of fact, only the
tallest of New-World skyscrapers rose
— or would rise, twenty-five hundred
years hence— to a greater height than
this magnificent ziggurat.

It was twilight when we at last
neared the city’s gates. Jipfur, the
nephew of Slaf-Carch, rode out to join
us, accompanied by two armored cav-
alrymen.

“Noble Slaf-Carch, the patesi of Bar-
bel, the brother of my mother, you have
returned from the dead!”

The meeting was replete with formal
greetings — it was plain to see that Jip-
fur relished the dignified formalities to
which his wealth and importance en-
titled him — but under the surface of
conventional manners, Slaf-Carch’s
deep gratitude showed, through glisten-
ing eyes. No matter if his rescue had
been coincidental; he was no less grate-

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

ful for having been miraculously saved.

J IPFUR made the most of it. He rode
back at the head of the procession,
boasting that he had sent his cavalry-
men against the nomads on a hunch
that it would please the gods.

We entered the gates of Babylon.
The street crowds joined pur proces-
sion, shouted praises to Jipfur.

“Again Jipfur has won against the
nomads!”

“Jipfur has brought back the patesi
of Borbel!”

Jipfur smiled jubilantly, holding his
pudgy head high, blinking his eyes
wisely, nodding ever so slightly toward
the wealthier merchants and their
wives.

Slaf-Carch was too happy to mind
these egotistical antics. He was wear-
ing a robe over his rags, now, and rid-
ing a cavalryman’s horse. He waved
at the throngs and shouted jovially at
old acquaintances. The warmth of this
reception made me proud I knew him,
even if he was a superstitious old coot.

“Yes, I was becoming entangled in
Babylonian alliances in spite of myself.

Eventually this night’s celebration
ended, and I was glad. All the wonders
of Babylon, including my first torch-
light glimpse of the famous Hanging
Gardens and the “Tower-of-Babel”
ziggurat, could not impress me, on this
tired night, half so much as Slaf-Carch’s
hospitality.

Once we reached his palace, at the
small suburb of Borbel, and once I had
shaved and bathed and feasted, I laid
myself away in a comfortable bed for
an indefinite season of sleeping. For
Slaf-Carch had commanded that I was
to be his special guest until my strength
returned.

And so, after more than eighteen
months of hardships, I turned a corner
— and it proved to be a swift turn in

more ways than one.

I lay in bed two mornings later, de-
bating whether I felt equal to the task
of rising and dressing, and had just
given up the struggle and let my eyes
fall closed, when I heard someone ap-
proaching my room.

Then X was half aware that a ser-
vant-girl entered. I saw her through
my eyelids, I suppose, for I was too
groggy from sleep to raise my head and
wmk at her — or order her out, as you
might have done. Still, I knew that
there was something unusual about her
— something disturbingly strange —

She placed some fresh clothing on
the foot of my bed, drew a curtain back
from the window to admit the fresh
yellow sunshine, picked up the empty
water vase from my table. For a mo-
ment she looked down at me curi-
ously —

I don’t know whether my half-closed
eyelids fluttered, but my pulse did. It
struck me like a bolt of lightning: This
girl was a blonde.

Nowhere in all these months had 1
seen a single light-haired person, male
or female, before this moment. The
Fertile Crescent just didn’t have ’em.
Maybe the soil wasn’t right, or the sun
was too hot. In a land of sand-blown
brunettes, here was an off-color female
whose beautiful face, blue eyes, and
yellow braids — not to mention breath-
taking curves— were calculated to make
kings hurl armies at each other.

She was not only beautiful; her clean-
liness and her make-up — though the
latter was too cunningly achieved to be
noticeable — were twenty-five centuries
ahead of these times.

CHE tiptoed toward the door with the
water vase, being careful not to
waken me. But my eyes were wide
open now, and I called to her in Eng-
lish, with the gentleness of a dynamite

BULL MOOSE OF BABYLON

blast: “Hey, there, you’re Betty, aren’t
you?”

The water vase crashed to the floor
— I couldn’t understand why. I hadn’t
meant to knock her off the Christmas
tree, but she whirled on me with a show
of anger.

“Why do you scare me to death, you
snail, you worm!” she blazed in Baby-
lonian, marching over to my bed, shak-
ing a scornful finger at me. “Are you
some kind of earthquake, that roars and
knocks vases out of people’s hands?”

“Wait a minute. I — ” Again I

started to speak in English, but her
rapid-fire Babylonian threw me for a
loss. The language was rich in pro-
fanity. She called down the wrath of
Shamash on me, and threw in the ill-
will of Marduk and Ishtar for good
measure. I pulled the covers up around
my ears.

By that time other servants and pal-
ace attendants were coming down the
corridor to see what had caused the
crash. To my surprise, the girl bent
close to me and snapped, in a warning
tone:

“I’ll talk with you later — in English."

The broken pottery was swept up,
though it couldn’t possibly be patched
up, no more than could my peace of
mind. Not that either had any value
in this palace. Vases might be broken,
slaves might be suspicious of Betty —
or jealous; but the startling point of the
incident was that Slaf-Carch himself
came in and cleaned up the mess.

Yes, he insisted on doing it, so that
I, his guest, wouldn’t be disturbed by
chattering slaves. But Slaf-Carch’s
real reason, I saw plainly, was to per-
form a favor for Betty. He smiled at
her, toothlessly, without the slightest
air of superiority, notwithstanding the
fact that he was the owner of this pal-
ace and ail that was in it, including

her. Suddenly I felt resentment.

He stopped to exchange pleasantries
with me, too, hoping I would feast with
him soon; then, as Betty started off
to her work elsewhere, he walked away
with her.

A jealous heat-wave did spirals
around my neck for the rest of the
day. It was a bad feeling, for me, a
guest, to have toward my benefactor.
Which started me to thinking. If I
could pay Slaf-Carch for this hospi-
tality — if I could pull some strings so
that I didn’t owe him anything, that
would clear the decks considerably.
Then. I could face him squarely, tell
him that a fifty-year-old Babylonian
had no business getting that way about
a nineteen-year-old foreigner-girl. Es-
pecially when there was a young for-
eigner-bachelor on the scene.

All right, that settled it. I would
pay cash for these few days of room
and board —

T)UT my situation wasn’t as simple
■^as I thought. Before I had been
Slaf-Carch’s guest a full week, his rich
young nephew Jipfur charioted out
from Babylon and announced that he
had come for me.

“I’m very comfortable here, thank
you,” I said.

“According to the property laws,"
Jipfur stated in his smooth but arro-
gant manner, “you are my rightful
slave. You were taken from the no-
mads by my expedition. You have
good muscles and will be worth all of
ninety shekels, when properly nour-
ished and put in working trim.”

Slaf-Carch protested, but his nephew
stuck stubbornly to his claim, Slaf-
Carch shrugged and said, “Then I will
buy Hal from you at once.”

Jipfur rudely reminded him that he
couldn’t afford me. The ugly truth was
that Slaf-Carch’s business had run

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

down badly during his two years of
absence, his finances having been nom-
inally in the hands of his nephew.

So I was Jipfur’s property.

“I regret,” said Slaf-Carch, placing
his hand on my shoulder, “that I can-
not purchase you now. But the time
will come, and I will remember.” Then
driving the hint of anger out of his
resonant voice, he concluded with a
remark characteristic of his generosity,
“My family is so proud of Jipfur, with
his dynamic business talents, I could'
not think of withholding from him any
prestige he has earned. Go, and be a
worthy slave for him.”

As we started toward Babylon, the
reins were placed in my hands. I had
just as well learn to drive a chariot
now, Jipfur said, if I were capable.
Kish, the slave who was Jipfur’s per-
sonal attendant, stood beside me to
teach me the tricks.

Our wheels sung over the sandy
tracks, we trotted down the palmy lane
that led out of the suburb. Beyond the
gates Jipfur snapped his fingers, and
Kish, quick on the trigger, grabbed
the reins out of my hands and stopped
the horses.

The cause of the sudden stop was
the sight of three ugly partially-masked
heads peering out of the tall cat-tails
in the roadside marsh. I was at a loss
to know whether they were humans
or scarecrows, and Kish wasn’t much
help when he whispered, “The Ser-
pents.”

To my surprise, Jipfur seemed to be
on speaking terms with these ragged,
uncouth, deformed creatures. He gave
them a few simple orders, and they
listened like three docile sheep.

“Understand, I want you to keep
apart,” Jipfur said. “There is terri-
tory enough to keep you busy separate-
ly. If people see you together too of-
ten you’ll lose your charm.”

Our chariot rolled on, and neither
Kish nor Jipfur made any comment to
reveal what sort of charm those for-
lorn and sinister-looking wretches pos-
sessed. Kish was stiffly silent, as a
good attendant should be, and I took
my cue from him. Jipfur, oblivious to
us, hummed pleasantly to himself.

VX/'E SWUNG off what was appar-

T ently the main road, took a by-
lane past a square of irrigated farm
land, and stopped only when we came
to the bank of the Euphrates river.
Here three female slaves were operat-
ing a shaduf, letting the pole down un-
til the long bucket filled, then elevat-
ing it and pouring it into the irriga-
tion trough.

One of the workers was Betty.

Jipfur stepped down from the char-
iot, walked over to them and asked
for a drink.

“Do you think, he is thirsty?” Kish
asked me.

That was a strange question, coming
from the lips of this slim, handsome,
well-disciplined young attendant. Its
cynicism told me volumes. Kish’s si-
lence in his master’s presence was the
silence of dynamite in cold storage. But
he was opening the way to an under-
standing between the two of us. He
added, “If that yellow-haired girl were
at the top of yonder ziggurat, Jipfur
would go there to be thirsty.”

“Now that I think of it,” I said, “I’m
thirsty too.”

I chanced the wrath of my new mas-
ter and all his gods by my bold action.
I stepped down from the chariot, and
before Jipfur came up from the water
jug to give me a merciless bawling-out,
I got in a sly word with Betty — and
that was what really counted.

“I’ve just been chained to Jipfur,”
I said. “But I’ll break jail whenever
you say — ”

BULL MOOSE OF BABYLON

“Here — one week from tonight,” she
whispered, scarcely looking at me,
“when the late moon rises.”

Jipfur ordered me back into the char-
iot, and after he had finished his jok-
ing with Betty, telling her he had tried
to buy her, but Slaf-Carch had wanted
all of four shekels, and he knew she
was only worth two, we drove back
down the lane. And you can betf I
memorized every turn in the road be-
tween that shaduj and the gates of
Babylon.

CHAPTER III

f\NE week later, an hour after mid-
night, I slipped' out of Babylon
and dog-trotted southward. I was a
good hour ahead of the moon — only
there wouldn’t be a moon tonight, or
stars either. The blackness was broken
only by the city’s torchlights and an
occasional flare of lightning.

No threatening storm could have
kept me from my appointment. The
past week of waiting had been like a
year.

Not that I hadn’t been busy every
minute. Learning to work for Jipfur
was no cinch. But, luckily for me, the
tall lanky attendant, Kish, had tipped
me off to the arrogant patesi’s pet
peeves, and tutored me on those mat-
ters that every young slave ought to
know. Such as, the best way to walk
out of the master’s palace at midnight
without being caught.

Thunder rumbled over my head.
“Betty won’t be there,” I kept telling
myself. “The storm may stop her. Or
Slaf-Carch—”

Up went my temperature again 1
After all the talk I had heard the past
week, the very thought of Slaf-Carch
and Jipfur set me on fire with jeal-
ousy. The rich young nephew was de-
termined to buy Betty before fall. His

uncle was holding out stubbornly.

I groped along through the darkness,
praying cynically to Marduk to keep
me between the irrigation ditches and
stop me before I walked into the river.
Then a streak of lightning burned
across the horizon, and there were the
black poles of the shaduj right before
me, and there was Betty waiting. Her
braids, blowing in the breeze, were plat-
inum under the purple flash.

“You are here,” I said in Babylonian.
“Did anyone come with you?”

“No one. I didn’t dare tell anybody
I was coming.”

Her fluent English was music to my
ears. Her low voice was rich and melod-
ic, and I couldn’t help thinking what
an interesting study it would be on the
vocoder.

“Sporting of you to come,” I, said.
“It’s a queer time and place for a date,
but if Babylonians go in for this sort
of thing, far be it from me to — ”

“Don’t lead me into the river, Mr.
Norton,” she said, and her fingers cling-
ing lightly to my arm drew me back.

“Just call me Hal,” I said, sensing
that I was quoting a line no doubt trite
even in these ancient times.

“It’s good luck to be near the Eu-
phrates,” said Betty, “but not so good
to fall in it.”

We sat on the sandy bank, enshroud-
ed by darkness. Betty repeated a
rhythmic little Babylonian proverb
about the Euphrates and good luck.
There was a legend, she said, that if
you looked upon the Euphrates a cer-
tain number of times — the exact num-
ber being unknown — you would not
die as other men. You would live on,
and your manner of life would become
a mystery to all men.

“Very probably,” I said.

“You mustn’t doubt it,” Betty de-
clared. “The Babylonians can prove it.
Have you seen a funny little flat-headed

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

man who stands at the foot of the great
ziggurat? He has stood there for gen-
erations, and they say he’ll still be there
when the ziggurat is gone. That’s be-
cause he looked uppn the Euphrates — ”
“The right number of times — -yes.
Very fanciful.”

TV/TY SLIGHTLY sarcastic interrup-
tion caused a momentary rift. I
couldn’t conceive of Betty’s taking any
stock in this balderdash, even though
some of these superstitious ancients
might choose to believe it.

“Curious if true,” I added, after the
silence had become oppressive. “I’ll
stop and talk with that funny little
flat-headed man some day.”

“He can’t talk — but he’s there.”
“Can’t? Is he alive?”

“He’s petrified — but he’s there ”

I’m afraid I laughed rather too heart-
ily. Betty didn’t intend any joke. With
all the earnestness of a superstition-
befogged Babylonian she clung to her
fanciful story. He was there, she re-
peated, so in a sense he was living on,
in a manner of life that was a mystery
to all men.

It was my turn to fall silent. Light-
ning flashed across the sky, raindrops
began to spatter intermittently.

“We’d better find shelter,” said
Betty.

She caught my hand and led me along
the riverbank to an overhanging rock
that protected us from the plopping
drops. It was a shelter which the slaves
often frequented, she said. I couldn’t
see a thing until the purple lightning
came. Then I caught sight of the shal-
low cavern we were in, a few yards
above the broad Euphrates. Now all
was black again, except for a few twink-
ling torchlights eight miles upstream —
Babylon, asleep.

“This river gets into your blood.
It’s making me over. It will do the

same for you.”

“Not if I can help it,” I Thought.
Aloud I said, “I’ve got no business
here. If there’s any way to go back
to twentieth century America — ”

“I know how you feel. I pampered
myself with the same sentiments for
the first year.”

“How long have you been here?”

“Nearly three years.”

“So you got trapped by the Colonel’s
lousy line, too?” I said, at last enjoy-
ing an opportunity to uncork my com-
pressed bitterness. “I suppose Milhol-
land gave you the same pep talk he
gave me — one week of the past — or two
at most — a thousand dollars a week —
fame and immortality for your contri-
bution to his celebrated collection of
animal voices?”

“Something like that,” said Betty re-
flectively.

“The guy’s a screwball.”

“Definitely.”

“How’d you get mixed up with him
in the first place?”

“He’s my uncle,” said Betty, and I
groaned like a punctured balloon. She
went on, unheeding, “He’s no ordinary
screwball — he’s the grand duke of all
screwballs. That’s why we’re stuck
here. You don’t mind my talking about
it?”

“Mind? I’ve practically gone blind
for lack of light on the subject,” I said.

npHE rain was smashing down on the
vast river now and our cavern
roared and groaned with echoes of the
violent percussions. The warm rock
wall was at our backs. Our shoulders
barely touched. Betty talked, and her
voice, close to my ear, was like a magic
whisper from far flung centuries against
the roar of the ages.

“I’ll begin with my father,” she said.
“He was a great man— a genius. If
he had lived, the world would have

BULL MOOSE OF BABYLON

looked up to him. He was a student
of Einstein, but he had his own distinct
theories of universes interlocked
through time. His experiments were
highly successful up to that fateful year
when he began to use time-transfer de-
vices,”

“Then your father was Professor
Clifton Milholland, the physicist and
inventor?”

“Yes. Unfortunately his laboratory
fell to my uncle, the absent-minded
Colonel, who is so zaney about making
a name for himself as a naturalist that
he’d gladly send you to the sun if any
new animal calls were to be found there.
That’s why you came here, wasn’t it?
What did you bring, a phonograph-
recorder?”

“A vocoder,” I said. “You’ve seen
the mused, I suppose? They break a
voice down into its simple elements,
such as volume — tone qualities —
pitch.”

“I remember,” said Betty. “And
they remake voices, too.”

“Right. This instrument of mine is
the latest, most compact model. I could
take an impression of your voice; then,
by operating the keys, I could make it
speak my words to you in your voice
— that is, in the same pitch-range, with
the same overtones, the same consonant
qualities, and so on. Your own mother
wouldn’t know but what it was you.”

“Remarkable,” she mused. “Have
you used it?”

“Not once. . . Well, I did take a
record of Slaf-Carch’s voice— he was
a vibrant, mellow baritone, you know
— but I never completed the demonstra-
tion. We were prisoners at the time,
and he was more interested in telling
me about a foreigner-girl named Betty.”

Betty quickly shifted the subject
away from dangerous ground. “I sup-
pose Jipfur has been curious about the
instrument?”

“He’s never seen it,” I said.

“Then you’ve hid it?”

“The fact is, I got rid of it a few
days before Jipfur claimed me.”

“Got rid of it?”

“Sold it — to a peddler with a mule
cart full of secondhand junk. I needed
a little coin to buy a present for Slaf-
Carch in exchange for my keep. The
peddler paid a good price. He said he
could pan it off on some magician as
a magic box. It looks magic enough — •
a solid black case — heavy — ”

“You must be a cousin, to Jack and
the Bean Stalk, selling a valuable in-
strument like that—”

“No one will know how to use it.
For that matter, I doubt if anyone will
open it. It locks like a steel chest,
and I forgot to throw in the key. But
some charlatan will get his money’s
worth.”

“And scare money out of innocent
peasants — you soulless creature,” said
Betty. "“I’d like to have heard it work,
just for the sake of old times. Did
you give the Colonel a demonstration?”

T WAS glad for the talk to drift back
to America. Betty’s coming to this
age was still a mystery to me; but I
knew we must have many things in
common. From the safe distance of
twenty-five centuries we began poking
fun at Colonel Milholland.

“The old boy began reading the en-
cyclopedia to me as soon as I dropped
in for an interview,” I recounted. “He
had a passage about a bull moose — its
mating season, and such.”*

“I suppose he offered to mount an
animal for you if you, could bring one
back from this age?”

“Come to think of it, he did. Though
it was his own wall-space he pointed
toward. He suggested a bull moose
with wide antlers. Don’t tell me he
♦See footnote page 72. — Ed.

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

expected you to bring back some big
game?”

“You haven’t seen me out gunning
for moose, have you?” she laughed.

“If anything, vice versa.”

“Meaning what?” she asked.

“Meaning that there’s a certain bull
moose by the name of Jipfur who dwells
in a forest called Babylon. If you re-
member, that encyclopedic article said
that in the fall the mating season — ”

“I suggest we change the subject,”
said Betty shortly.

“Very well,” I said. “But I’m still
in the dark as to why you came here.”

“In search of my family,” said Betty,
a pained note in her voice.

She told me the whole story.

Her father had insisted on being the
first to try his own invention. She and
her brother were on the roof porch
with him, at their Rocky Mountain lab-
oratory, and preparations were almost
complete. There were keys provided
for any of a hundred different time
jumps.

Suddenly Colonel Milholland came
out to join them, and in his blundering
absent-minded way he dropped a book
on the keys.

“Father had warned that the ma-
chine would cut clean,” Betty said.
“The instant the book struck the keys,
the big magic hoops swished down from
overhead and caught my father just
as he was crossing the transfer zone.
His head was sliced instantly.”

The girls’ voice became a tense whis-
per.

“At once he was gone — all except
the tell-tale evidence of the deadly
stroke. His left leg had been sliced
diagonally below the knee. The se-
vered part lay there, not bleeding. And
with it — ”

“A part of the head?”

“Yes. A left section of the forehead,
with most of the left eyeball, the left

cheekbone, part of the nose, mouth,
chin — ”

“But the rest of his body?”

“Gone — through time— to one of the
hundred distant ages.”

pTER whisper ceased, and there was
only the solid, soothing roar of
downpouring rain.

“Couldn’t you recover the body?” I
asked.

“Not a gambler’s chance,” said Betty
with a sigh. Her voice was strong and
firm, now, for she had long reconciled
herself to the tragedy. “You see, the
instant it happened, the Colonel, seeing
what he had done, jerked the book off
the keys. Which ones he had struck
we’ll never know.”

“No dust marks?”

“We applied the miscroscope with-
out much luck. Finally our best guess
was that he had shot backward about
twenty-five centuries, which may have
been a few hundred years long, or short.
Anyhow, when the Colonel, months
later, decided to use the time machine
for his hobby, my brother agreed to
make the passage if the Colonel would
send him back twenty-five hundred
years.”

“Then your brother did come here?”
“Yes — but he accomplished nothing.
If father’s body came to this age it was
either devoured by lions, or buried. No
clue was ever found. That was the
end of that. For a time my brother
squandered his days in nature study,
but soon he realized that he had come
on a one-way time-ride, so he cast his
lot with the patesi who took him in —
good old Slaf-Carch.”

“Good old Slaf-Carch,” I echoed.
“When my brother failed to return,”
Betty continued, “I suspected that the
Colonel wasn’t operating the time ma-
chine correctly for return trips. I
wanted him to call in some scientists,

BULL MOOSE OF BABYLON

8 *

but he was too conceited. Besides, we
had all of my father’s instructions in
black and white. So we pondered over
them, but they were too deep for me.
I had to admit that the Colonel seemed
to be on the right track, as far as I
could tell.”

“Then you signed up for a one-way
ride, I suppose?”

“Yes. My brother had made me
promise not to follow him, but I was
desperate, with him and Dad both gone.
If they had been swallowed up in thin
air, I might as well know the worst.”

That was Betty — as nervy as they
come. She was strong and adventurous.
A girl had to be, to come through the
crises she’d faced. A man looks at a
beautiful girl and tells himself there’s
his prize and the campaign’s as good as
won. But Betty Milholland — well,
maybe the man had better think twice,
whether his name is Slaf-Carch, or Jip-
fur — or Hal Norton.

r T“'HOSE were my thoughts as she
went on with her story. She had
reached this age, she said, just in time
to talk with her brother before his
death. A chariot wheel had cut him
down. He had been in Slaf-Carch’s
service. A band of Assyrian cutthroats
had made a surprise attack on Borbel,
and the suburb had suffered several
casualties.

Betty felt no bitterness toward Slaf-
Carch. She was proud that her brother
had raillied to the town’s defense, and
proud that Slaf-Carch had later led a
retaliatory expedition — though this lat-
ter effort had been ill-fated, having led
to Slaf-Carch’s own capture and even-
tual enslavement.

“There,” said Betty, darting out of
her seriousness, I’ve given you so much
personal data you’ll feel like a personal
credit corporation. Do I get the loan,
or don’t I?”

“I think we can arrange a mortgage,
Miss Milholland,” I said, “On your
estimated value of — er — what did Jip-
fur say you were worth?”

Her joking mood stopped short at the
mention of Jipfur. She had heard
rumors, she said bitterly, that she
wasn’t supposed to hear. Jipfur had
offered Slaf-Carch a hundred and
twenty shekels for her. However, she
had been secretly informed ’that Claf-
Carch would never sell her. With that
assurance, she had determined to ac-
cept her lot as a Babylonian slave.

The rain was over. The clouds
opened and a streak of hazy moonlight
sifted down on the river. Two wet,
ragged creatures came up the river
path, black against the graying sky.

As they came closer, I guessed them
to be two of the three “Serpents” I
had seen a week before. They entered
the cavern and melted into the black-
ness of the wall opposite us.

I do not know whether they could see
us. They talked in hushed tones, then
fell silent.

“It’s nearly dawn,” Betty whispered.
“I must get back.”

“I’ve been living for the past eighteen
months for this talk with you,” I said.
“But now that a couple ragamuffins
have intruded on our date, how about
making it again soon?”

“We don’t dare risk seeing each other
often,” said Betty, “except as we hap-
pen to meet in the line of duty. But
under the surface of convention we’ll
know that we’re — friends.”

I suggested that she might usei a
stronger word than “friends.” After
all, we had everything in common —
But my delusions about falling in
love were instantly derailed.

“1LTAL, if were back in our own cen-
1 tury,” Betty said, with a frank-
ness that was dizzying, “you’re the sort

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

of fellow I might fall for without half
trying. But we’d better face the facts.
We’re stuck here — five hundred and
fifty B. C. Whatever we’ve been
brought up to believe is right or wrong,
the right thing in this age is for us to
submit to the ways of Babylonian
slaves.”

“You don’t mean that you’ll go
through with all the ghastly obliga-
tions?”

“Hal, don’t misunderstand me. I’m
not considering my own desires. Slaf-
Carch is a great man among his fellow
men. He’s wealthy, he’s honest, he’s
respected for what he is. His slaves
are proud to have him for a master.
And in this civilization every female
slave who comes into womanhood is
proud to bear children for her master.”
“Betty 1” The hard gasp that
escaped my lips caused the ragged crea-
tures who were sharing our cave to stir
uneasily. They had been so quiet, after
shaking off their soaked outer garments
and settling down, that I had forgotten
them.

“S-s-shl” said Betty. “You’ll wake
our chaperons.”

“But what you were saying, Betty —
it’s -outlandish. I can’t believe that a
swell girl like you — ”

“I am Slaf-Carch’s property.” Again
her voice was low, impassionate. “I’ve
gone through weeks of mental torture
to bring myself to that realization. But
I’ve come to a decision — the only de-
cision possible in these times. You
mustn’t shatter it, Hal. I am subject
to the Babylonian property laws.
Within a few days, when Slaf-Carch
calls for me, I will come.”

“All right,” I said finally, and my
words came forth bitterly. “We under-
stand each other.”

“I know you’ll hate me, Hal, because
you haven’t begun to live in these
times.”

“I’d take a train for home this min-
ute if I could,” I said.

“Without any farewells, no doubt.”
Betty rose to go.

“One question, Betty.” I must have
stood challengingly in her path, for her
starlit eyes searched me curiously.

“If Jipfur buys you, as I’m sure he
means to do — ”

“Hal 1 Don’t say it I ”

“Jipfur is handsome,” I said icily.
“He’s hot-tempered and he’s masterful.
Personally I think he’s conceited, and
I know he’s a coward. But that’s be-
side the point.”

“What is the point?”

“That there’ll be more than slave
customs and economic arrangements in-
volved when Jipfur buys you.”

Betty’s face turned away from me.
She looked anxiously at the gray streak
spreading across the horizon, at the
velvet shadows across the broad black
river.

“If he buys me, I may obey — or I
may come to this river — ”

She gave a little sigh, then tried to
fling her troubled thoughts away with a
toss of her braided tresses. She led the
way out of the cave, dropping some
comical remarks about our chaperons,
the tattered rascals who lay in a snor-
ing heap not twenty feet from where
we had been sitting.

CURIOUSLY there were three of
them now, the third one being the
huge deformed member of the Serpent
Trio, looking no less repulsive than a
week before.

“That third fellow must have been
here already,” said Betty, “only it was
so dark when we entered the cave we
couldn’t see him.”

“I hope he was asleep, considering
all we’ve been saying,” I said. “Or
have we been talking any Babylonian?”
“Mostly English, I think,” said

BULL MOOSE OF BABYLON

Betty.

We took off our sandals to wade
through the mud holes along the lane.
Betty was a carefree child again, chas-
ing along beside me, laughing with glee
as the mud squashed up through her
toes.

But I was weighed down with the
heaviest mood of a lifetime. The tor-
ment that Betty had fought through
was now mine to fight.

Daylight was fast approaching by
the time we reached the crossroads.
Each of us would have to hurry to get
back undiscovered. But I had to have
my final say, and it wasn’t an easy
job.

“Thanks for all you’ve told me,
Betty,” I said. “There’s not much I
can do. But I know how you feel about
Jipfur, so count on me. I’m fighting
on your side, and I’ll give my right arm
rather than let Slaf-Carch sell you.”

“Hal—”

Whatever she meant to say evidently
couldn’t be said in words, for she looked
up at me with serious trusting eyes,
caught my shoulders with her hands,
kissed me.

For a long moment we kissed. Then
we parted.

CHAPTER IV

AT HIGH noon two days later a
parade formed in the scanty shade
of the park that surrounded Jipfur’s
palace.

Kish and I were near the front of
the parade, resplendent in our fancy
gold and green uniforms, riding the
backs of a handsome team hitched to
the first chariot.

We were merely ornaments, of
course, dressed to match the gold and
green harness of the horses. But we .
had a right to feel important, neverthe-
less, because our chariot was occupied

by Jipfur’s haughty sister and her two
ladies-in-waiting.

But Kish didn’t feel important. He
wouldn’t have shared Jipfur’s artificial
self-glorification if he’d been dressed in
pure gold. He was cynical about pomp
and ceremony anyway, and doubly so
when instigated by Jipfur.

“It smells like rotten figs to me,”
Kish kept whispering to me on the sly.
“Why should he put on all this public
show for a man he tries to cheat in
private?”

Jipfur led the parade, needless to say.
We lumbered into action, following him
straight through the heart of the city.

I must admit that Jipfur had the ap-
pearance of a man born to ride at the
head of a parade. The pose of his some-
what pudgy head, the bearing of his
slightly stocky shoulders, the proud lift
of his arms as he held the reins of his
horse, gave him an aspect of supreme
grandeur fully as convincing as his
magnificent regalia.

His costume was a mixture of the
ceremonial uniform of a devout patesi
and the gleaming armor of a warrior.
He wore the priest’s tall cone-shaped
cap, specially ornamented with a band
of carved gold. This band blended
effectively with his tawny forehead, be-
stowing a golden quality upon his hand-
some thick-set face.

“The bull moose!” I chuckled to
myself. Two locks of black hair
spiralled out from under his conical cap
like a mountain goat’s horns. If Betty
had been here I would have pointed
them out as antlers.

The crowds closed in around us as we
entered the market streets. Here and
there a pompous merchant shouted at a
lackey to fetch his chariot or his riding
horse so that he could join the proces-
sion. All manner of men joined us,
from bankers to vagabonds. Before
we came within sight of the king’s

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

palace, street crowds and paraders were
all rolled into the same snowball. The
rumor that there would be feasting at
the end of the march did nothing to
lessen the parade’s popularity.

J^EYOND the king’s palace Jipfur
called a halt and made a speech.
In the shadow of the great ziggurat he
made another. And when we reached
the city’s gates, by now a crowd of
fully five thousand, Jipfur made the
most eloquent speech of all. He ap-
peared completely convinced of his own
big-heartedness in instigating this cele-
bration.

“Our beloved Slaf-Carch will be the
most surprised patesi in the valley when
we pour in upon him to do him honors,”
Jipfur shouted grandly, and the wobble
of his tall cone-shaped cap kept pace
with his gesturing arms. “But Slaf-
Carch deserves our honors. He is a
great man and a great patriot ! ”

Everybody cheered, and the inevi-
table riff-raff made noises on all manner
of cymbals and noise-beaters.

“No one has missed Slaf-Carch more
than I during his long absence. I do
not refer to the fact that the care of
all of his property burdened me with
heavy responsibilities. I refer to that
affection which every man holds for his
fellow countrymen. I knew that Slaf-
Carch was not dead. The gods told
me so. That is why I sent out expedi-
tion after expedition to make forays
among the nomads — with what result?
At last, by the grace of Marduk, acting
through me, his faithful servant, Slaf-
Carch has been recovered.”

Another pandemonium of noise and
cheering.

“And so, fellow men,” Jipfur con-
cluded, “let us march on to Borbel and
surprise our esteemed patesi and patriot
by entering his palace singing his
praises.”

On we marched, and thousands of
lusty throats among us gave out with
thundering anthems whose weird and
freakish melodies I took to denote
abounding joy. Even the two aristo-
cratic ladies-in-waiting who accom-
panied Jipfur’s sister must have been
singing; the squeaking chariot wheels
couldn’t have made all the shrill sounds
from that vicinity.

Within two miles of Borbel a pair of
messengers raced ahead to be sure the
way was clear. They didn’t race back.
As we entered Borbel and approached
Slaf-Carch ’s palace we still saw nothing
of the messengers.

There was a crowd of people milling
among the glazed blue columns at the
entrance. They must have seen us com-
ing, but they didn’t come out to greet us.

This was strange. We couldn’t un-
derstand it. Our hilarious spirits suf-
fered a mysterious chill, we slackened
our pace, then stopped. Jipfur com-
manded us to wait and he rode up to the
palace entrance alone.

For several minutes he seemed to be
carrying on an earnest conversation
with the group of peasants and slaves.
Finally he rode back to us, and there
was deep trouble in his face. He lifted
his arms to silence the low murmur of
voices, then addressed us in leaden
tones.

“Bow your heads. The gods be with
us while I tell you the awful thing that
has happened. This morning Slaf-
Carch was missing* No one knew where
he had gone. The palace was searched,
but there was no sign that he had
planned to depart.”

Jipfur paused, mopped the perspira-
tion from his golden forehead, took a
deep breath, and continued.

“But he has been found. Even as
we were approaching this village, three
of Slaf-Carch’s slaves, searching for
him in the garden, came upon his body.

BULL MOOSE OP BABYLON

Slaf-Carch has been cruelly murdered.”

The groan that swept over the five
thousand paraders was like an ava-
lanche.

Jipfur waited for silence, then added
a few words of dismissal to the shocked
holiday crowd. It was all anyone could
have done under the circumstances.

“If there is any further word con-
cerning the cause of this ghastly deed,
that word will be brought to you in
Babylon. But as we all know, Slaf-
Carch had no enemies. This very mul-
titude testifies to the fact that all men
paid him honor and respect. There is
no more that any of you can do. Re-
turn to your homes, and when it is time
for the burial rites we will gather at
the Cave of Tombs.”. . .

'T'WO days later I attended Slaf-
Carch’s funeral.

The parade of honor had been vast,
but it was nothing compared to this
gathering. Fully fifteen thousand peo-
ple swarmed the rocky hillsides, and
you could hear the low-whispered
praises for the deceased all about you.
Not the cheap and shoddy kind, like
cheers and noise-makings of a mob
stirred by a speech, but the deep-felt
praises that have been earned by kind-
ness and fair dealing.

Kish and I stood at the service of
Jipfur and his family of mourners dur-
ing the ceremony. The afternoon shad-
ows spread over us and we could see
the thousands of faces gathered close
around the mouth of the yellow rock
cavern. I searched those faces until I
spotted Betty. 4

There were no signs of weeping in
her strong face, but I saw that she
could not bear to look at me.

Many a patesi, including Jipfur, said
words over the body. Jipfur’s egotism
was somewhat tempered, for once; but
I couldn't help noticing that his eyes

were furtive as if casting about to gauge
the dramatic effect of his stoutly uttered
prayers and tributes.

Everyone, of course, would remember
the bruised and partially crushed face
of Slaf-Carch. He had been stoned to
death. That was all his dazed, shocked
mourners knew; perhaps all they would
ever know, I thought.

After the body had been sealed in
its prepared niche deep within the yel-
low rock cave, a signal from a patesi
indicated that the ceremony was at an
end. And yet for a moment the mul-
titude waited, motionless, as if reluctant
to break the spell of its own silent
tribute to Slaf-Carch.

Suddenly a voice sounded from the
yellow rock cave.

“My people, I have witnessed your
grief for me on this day.”

It was a rich, resonant baritone voice,
ringing strong and clear, as if amplified
by the cavern walls. It was the voice
of Slaf-Carch.

Kish’s fingers dug into my arm. He
gasped.

“What was that?”

pVERYONE who heard the voice
was asking the same thing. The
mourners turned to each other aghast.
There was no mistaking that voice.

The throngs too far back to know
what had happened began to crowd
closer. What was the meaning of all
this gasping, these frightened faces, this
statue-like tension?

Suddenly the voice came again.

“My people, you have been outraged
by the dastardly crime committed
against me. Then let me say to you,
the man who murdered me is among
you ”

My suspicions were blow-torching in
Betty’s direction by this time. I glared
at her. She didn’t see me. Like a few
hundred others she appeared to be in

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

a frenzy.

Panic-stricken persons broke out of
their nightmarish freezes and began
scurrying away, glancing back through
eyes of terror. But at this moment
Betty caught the sleeve of a patesi,
whispered something in his ear. He
nodded eagerly, called three other men
of importance into the huddle, swiftly
convinced them of something.

Immediately one of these men began
to call to the turbulent crowd. “Listen
to me!”

He mounted a rock and succeeded in
gesturing the restless horde to peace.

“What we have heard was the voice
of Slaf-Carch.”

The people glanced to the cave and
back to the speaker. No one thought
of disagreeing.

“Slaf-Carch is living on,” the speaker
continued, “in a manner that we cannot
understand. It’s the old legend — ”

There were rumblings of dissension.
But once more the rich baritone voice
vibrated through the walls of the yel-
low rock cave.

“I have looked upon the river —
many, many times. . In my own way I
shall continue to live among you. Go,
now, and remember what I have said.”

That was that. The speaker who had
mounted the rock simply gestured to-
ward the cave. Nothing more was
needed. The people murmured with
wonderment, telling each other that
they had always believed that legend,
but here, at last, was a living proof.

At once they grew excited over the
prospects of Slaf-Carch’s new existence.
He had been murdered, but he was still
living, in his own way — and he knew his
murderer .

The snap of fingers brought Kish and
me to attention.

“Return to Borbel at once,” came
Jipfur’s brittle command. “Inform the
palace that I shall come this evening to

assume possession of all properties, in-
cluding lands, slaves, and livestock.”

CHAPTER V

J^OBODY but a sap would walk
around all week with a sharp tack
in the heel of his shoe, prodding him at
every step. But that’s practically what
I did — only in my case the tack was in
the heel of my brain, and the pain
throbbed even when I was supposed to
be sleeping.

In other words, the steel-sharp mem-
ory of what Betty had said she’d do
in case she fell to Jipfur— namely, con-
sider throwing herself into the Euphra-
tes — was driving me wild.

And the worst of it was, I couldn’t
do a thing about it. I was Jipfur’s
slave, as never before, and do you think
he kept me on the hop? With all of
his new business to look after, he was
loading every competent slave to the
limit with new responsibilities.

A few weeks earlier, when Slaf-Carch
was still in there pitching for me, I con-
gratulated myself that he’d made Jipfur
give me a white-collar job. Now I be-
gan to envy the strong-backed lads and
lassies who worked the shadujs for the
irrigation streams. At least they got to
rest while their buckets filled.

I tried my best, but I couldn’t man-
age to break away for a jaunt to Borbel.
I needed a talk with Betty worse than
I needed food or drink. What’s more,
I was burning up for a chance to ex-
amine the scene of Slaf-Carch’s murder
— for, as Kish said, that deal had the
smell of rotten figs.

Of course Jipfur’s guards, together
with the king’s law-enforcement agents,
were on the job. But they failed to
unearth any murderer. Rumor was
that they had questioned several night
prowlers, including the Three Serpents,
on general principles. But their in-

BULL MOOSE OF BABYLON

vestigation came to nothing.

One afternoon Kish stopped by to
tell me he had cleared the inner palace
garden for a unique occasion. Several
slaves inherited from Slaf-Carch had
just arrived. Jipfur would interview
them this evening and assign them to
their places.

“I shall be conducting the slaves to
the inner garden as Jipfur calls for
them/’ Kish said, lifting his eyebrow
significantly. “If anything of interest
comes along I’ll let you know.”

My work suffered the rest of that
afternoon. The only thing of impor-
tance that I accomplished was to
sharpen a small iron knife.

TT WAS nearly sundown when Kish

came scurrying past » my room to
whistle a signal. I dropped my work
and slipped up a narrow stairs to the
inner garden balcony.

I looked down on the luxurious scene
Jipfur had chosen for his interviews.
Long shadows from the evening sun
painted broad stripes across the inclosed
garden. The fountain under the open
sky sprayed thin streams of liquid gold
— which meant that somewhere under
the garden promenade, where tunnels
were hidden, slaves were carrying buck-
ets of water to replenish the fountain
reservoir.

Jipfur was the picture of leisure, ly-
ing on a red brocaded lounge, his cone-
shaped cap pushed well back on his
broad handsome head, his pudgy fin-
gers idly counting the tassel strings of
his gold and white robe.

He was facing the fountain in the
center of the court, and I didn’t intend
letting him know that I was eavesdrop-
ping from a point almost directly above
him.

Then came the dreaded but inevitable
entrance. Betty was conducted into
Jipfur’s presence. The patesi suavely

asked her to sit down, and he dismissed
Kish.

A moment later Kish tiptoed along
the balcony to join me.

“She’s just a child,” Kish whispered.

“Jipfur doesn’t think so,” I retorted.

It was plain, from Jipfur’s talk, how-
ever, that he was annoyed at her for
coming in braids and a simple slave-
girl dress. He had expected her to be
adorned in something charming for this
occasion.

Of course Jipfur didn’t guess that she
had applied her skillful arts of make-up
to accentuate this juvenile effect. I
caught this at once; but I also saw that,
in spite of her efforts, Betty was none-
theless breathtakingly beautiful.

“I’ll pardon you for your appearance
this time,” said Jipfur. “You’ve spent
too many days in field work. After
you get used to indoor work and learn
a few manners you’ll be worth all of six
shekels.”

Jipfur laughed at his joke, but Betty
didn’t see anything funny, and neither
did I. I was right at the edge of the
rail, feeling like a bomb about to drop.
But I hadn’t realized, until Kish whis-
pered, “Better put that away,” that I
had drawn my iron knife from my
pocket.

Now our lord and master was urging
Betty to come closer. She quietly re-
fused, and a flame of ill-temper red-
dened Jipfur’s face. He rose to his
feet, began to pace before her.

Again Kish placed a restraining hand
on my arm.

“I’d better take that knife,” he whis-
pered.

I shook my head. The scared look
in Kish’s face didn’t deter me. I was
too intent upon Jipfur, whose every
word and action was shooting my eyes
through with red. The damned bull
moose was flaunting his authority in
the manner that was nothing short of

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

bestial. I intended to do something.

TJETTY kept eluding him with cun-
ning evasions. But Jipfur was the
master. The weight of all Babylonian
law was back of him. He drove his ad-
vantage with the finesse of a skilled
executioner.

I crouched, trembling. No matter
that this would be the end of me. The
thing was to make my leap true, and
make an end of Jipfur. Betty would
be certain to fall into safer hands.

I glanced back of me. Kish was gone.
That was just as well. No need for
him to be dragged into this crime as an
accomplice.

Now I was barely clinging to the bal-
cony edge, gauging the twenty-foot
drop. Jipfur had caught Betty’s hands,
was trying to draw her into an embrace.
The terror in her eyes was awful to see
— worse because it was touched with a
hint of resignation to her inevitable fate.

Then she caught sight of me, knew
that I was about to jump. Instantly
she cried out — in English I

“Don’t do it! Don’t do it I”

Jipfur let go one of her hands, whirl-
ing to see whether there was an In-
truder. Momentarily I jumped back
out of sight. Then a booming voice
sounded from out of nowhere — the rich
baritone of Slaf-Carch.

“Jipfur . . . Jipfur ... I am speak-
ing to you.”

The power of that voice was no less
than it had been at the Cave of Tombs.
I sank to my knees, still clutching the
iron knife, and bent to the rail’s edge
to see —

Jipfur stood in his tracks, open-
mouthed. Beads of perspiration showed
at the edges of his black wavy hair.

The voice came again.

“Jipfur, have you everything you
want now? Have you?”

Jipfur, turning dizzily, stammered an

answer. He didn’t want anything. He
hadn’t asked for this new inheritance.

“Have you everything you want, Jip-
fur?” The voice repeated.

Jipfur snarled. “Why all these ques-
tions? Are you accusing me — ”

“Careful, Jipfur. People may be lis-
tening. Unless you mean to confess — ”

“I’ve nothing to confess. Get away.
Quit hounding me. I don’t believe in
you.”

“Do you believe in yourself, Jipfur?
Who was it that shouted to the parade,
‘Slaf-Carch is a man of great honor’?
Have you forgotten your eloquence so
soon?”

“Go away! Leave me alone! ”

“Very well. I will leave you — for a
price.”

“Price?” .

“Give Betty another year of free-
dom.”

“Another year!” Jipfur roared.
“That’s ridiculous. This is the jail—’’

“There will be another fall, Jipfur.”

/'NUT of anguished eyes, Jipfur stared
at Betty, as if trying to convince
himself she hadn’t heard. But she
nodded to him, and a faint smile of vic-
tory touched her lips. Slowly she backed
away from him and fled from the
court. . . .

Kish and I threaded our way, that
midnight, by the light of the stars to
the Cave of Tombs.

Kish had heard the conversation be-
tween Slaf-Carch’s voice and Jipfur,
and somehow it got him worse than be-
fore. The first time he had excused as
a sort of mass delusion. But now he
was convinced that Slaf-Carch couldn’t
be dead. Nothing would do but we have
a look in the cave of the dead to prove it.

My own nerves, I must admit, were
considerably joggled. This midnight
jaunt to the Cave of Tombs wasn’t
what my twentieth-century physician

BULL MOOSE OF BABYLON

would have prescribed for one in my
chaotic state of mind. Kish, however,
expressed wonder that I could be so
calm and collected, and demanded to
know whether I had some insight. I
evaded his question.

We began jabbing at the sealed door
with our heavy metal tools — about
three jabs apiece. What stopped us
was Slaf-Carch’s voice.

“Why dig for me? You saw my
crushed body laid away.”

Kish gulped hard. “I — I can’t un-
derstand. That foolish legend — ”

“Believe it,” said the voice. “That
will be simplest. And now — a word to
both of you — about Jipfur. Watch him,
but serve him, with vision. Now go.”

If I had had a flashlight I would
have combed those jagged rocks and
put my curiosity at rest then and
there. But Kish had already bounded
off at the word go.

It was good to be out in the fresh
night air again, and we moved along at
a good pace. It was what our pent-up
nerves needed.

I suggested that we take advantage of
the moonless night to swing around by
way of Borbel. Kish was willing. He
was an understanding cuss, no less so
for his cynicism, and he hit the nail on
the head when he said, “Anything to
postpone crawling back under Jipfur’s
thumb.”

I pondered his remark as we hiked
along through the blackness. Unques-
tionably there would be an electric ten-
sion in the air every time I entered
Jipfur’s presence from now on, for I
was potentially his murderer. Except
for Betty’s outcry, and the diverting in-
trusion of Slaf-Qarch’s mystic voice,
I would have earned a one-way ticket
into a fiery furnace.

hJ'OW there was a shadowy form
1 ahead of us, moving along the crest

of the hillside. We overtook it, or
rather, her, for there was just enough
starlight to reveal — Betty!

“I thought so,” I said accusingly.
"Something told me you were out here
in this midnight wilderness.”

“I was sent back to Borbel,” said
Betty, “but there was no use trying to
sleep after that horrifying fracas with
Jipfur.”

“We’ve been at Slaf-Carchs’ grave,”
said Kish. “He spoke to us again.”
“Oh?” Betty seemed curious to hear
all about it. When Kish finished, she
commented, “Now, at least, you will be-
lieve the legend.”

“Personally, I’m not so dense,” I
said skeptically. “But sooner or later,
Betty, you’ll need a new electric bat-
tery.” I borrowed some words from
English to finish my sentence.

She turned her starlit face toward me
blankly. “I don’t know what you’re
talking about, Hal.”

“You’re very clever,” I said.

“Indeed you are,” Kish added, miss-
ing my point completely. “The way
you defended yourself against Jip-
fur — ”

“Kish,” said Betty in a low earnest
voice, “you heard Slaf-Carch’s voice,
the same as I did? And you, Hal? . . .
Did you catch the implication? Jipjur
murdered Slaf-Carch. There was no
other possible interpretation—”

“Not so fast, Betty,” I warned.
“Maybe that voice doesn’t know.
Maybe it was just guessing.”

“But that voice is Slaf-Carch — his
spiritual self, still alive — ”

I sputtered and gasped for air. Was
she pulling the wool over my eyes?
This was exasperating.

“We’ve got to keep this confidential
— the three of us,” she went on. “The
danger is far greater than you think.
The rumor is already rampant among
the slaves that Jipfur is guilty.”

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

“What?” said Kish. “So soon? It
was only this evening that — ”

“I didn’t start the rumor,” said Betty.
“But that’s exactly what Jipfur will
think if he learns that the slaves held
a mass meeting — ”

“Meeting? When? Where?”

The three of us stopped and Betty
pointed back to the hillside trail over
which we had come. “That’s where I’ve
been she said. “There were hundreds
of slaves gathered in the darkness. I
didn’t get close enough to make myself
known, and I left early. A group like
that is sure to be full of spies.”

“The Serpents were there, no doubt,”
said Kish. “They’re Jip fur’s informa-
tion agents and high-pressure men.”

T>ETTY said that the meeting didn’t
promise any action, but everyone
agreed that Jipfur was the only man
who stood to gain by Slaf-Carch’s mur-
der. Everyone aired his grievances
against Jipfur but no one could see any
chance for a rebellion.

“The peasants were there, too,” she
said, “and they complained of oppres-
sive taxes that they were frightened
into paying — ”

“By the Serpents,” said Kish. “Those
peasants are so superstitious that any
fake magician can intimidate them.”
“All in all,” said Betty, “the people
are in a fighting mood. It spells trouble
ahead for a certain headstrong young
patesi named Jipfur.”

Kish and I escorted Betty to Borbel
and hied ourselves on to Babylon be-
fore daybreak. We entered the palace
separately, hoping tq escape notice.

I had just closed the heavy wooden
door of my room when a knock sounded.
A guard escorted me to Jipfur’s council
room.

Jipfur sat at the head of the ebony
table between yellow candles, looking
sleepless and worried. Three or four

of his advisers were talking with him as
I entered. He scowled from under his
towsled black hair and barked at me.

“Hal, your position as patesi ’s atten-
dant has ended. The troubles are crop-
ping up too fast in the complaint de-
partment, and so — ”

He paused for a draft of air through
his thick lips. I stared at him, thinking
how his thick, handsome face would
have looked if I had plunged that knife
in his back.

“Since you were a protege of Slaf-
Carch,” he said, “I hereby promote you
to the rank of Minister. You begin work
tomorrow.”

CHAPTER VI

D UMORS swept through Babylon
V like a devastating sandstorm:
Slaves and peasants who had been loyal
workers for Slaf-Carch were harboring
angry suspicions. They were holding
secret meetings.

This news sifted through the glazed
hallways of Jipfur’s palace with the
chill of an oncoming blizzard.

Jipfur called the Serpents in for a
session behind closed doors. The busi-
ness end of the palace became a chaos
of conferences — Some with bankers and
merchants— some with military guards
— some with alley rats. The magnifi-
cent Jipfur was in a jam, and he reached
out for moral support in all directions.
He doubled his military guard. He in-
creased his Serpent gang from three to
six.

Meanwhile I took over the duties of
Minister of Complaints, a job that was
ninety-nine percent hot water. My ap-
pointment was a clever maneuver on
Jipfurs’ part, aimed to quiet the com-
plaints of Slaf-Carch’s old followers.
For it was well known that “Hal, the
young foreigner” had stood in good
stead with Slaf-Carch.

BULL MOOSE OF BABYLON

But I had no panacea for the growing
unrest. I could feel trouble coming on.
It came — a year of it- — in a series of
roaring avalanches.

Jipfur spent six violent weeks reor-
ganizing, and among other changes he
was forced to appoint two additional
clean-up men to take care of his own
offices. They were needed to scoop up
the thousands of clay tablets that he
smashed all over the floors. Tablets
were pulverized by the ton in his con-
stant shifting of business deals and
countermanding of orders.

Jipfur, I soon realized, was on the
ragged edge of cracking up.

My new office, located in the business
end of the palace, gave me an inside
track on his affairs. He was at once
the most interesting and the most per-
turbing case of human explosion I ever
witnessed.

Back of it all was Slaf-Carch’s mys-
terious voice. Whether it spoke to him
daily or only at rare intervals no one
knew. But all the wealth and power
in Babylon can’t soothe a man If he
thinks that the uncle he murdered is
watching over his shoulder, waiting for
a chance to vociferously bawl him out
in public.

Besides the hot coals of guilt that
scorched the bull moose’s backbone,
there was the stab of defeat through his
heart — assuming he had a heart. Tem-
porarily he had lost Betty. And I’ll
never forget the volcano of rage that
roared out of his office that morning
when his aristocratic sister dropped in
to ask him why he had postponed as-
signing the yellow-haired slave wench,
and then tried to kid him about it.

“There will be another fall, Jipfur,”
the voice of Slaf-Carch had said.

Those words were the torch that
lighted Jipfur ’s mind — the blowtorch
that ignited his actions during the
year’s seasons that followed.

ACROSS a ten-foot patch of palace
wall a clay calendar was built. This
was Jipfur’s crafty device for impres-
sing Betty with his lustful will. He
transferred her from Borbel to this
palace, presented her with a dainty
brass hatchet, and commanded that she
chop out a number from the clay calen-
dar for every day that passed.

The ring of the little brass hatchet
would frequently bring Jipfur striding
out to the calendar, smiling arrogantly
at her, gloating that time was marching
on. Another fall would come.

This daily exercise became the bane
of Betty’s existence.

“I could sink that hatchet in his dizzy
skull,” she confided to Kish and me.

Kish and I breakfasted with Betty
these days. Our threesome, wedged into
the morning’s schedule before the big
shots were up, was the bright spot of
the day. Betty said it was all that kept
her courage up.

Nominally, her job was to manage
the table service for Jipfur, his sister,
and their clique of dignitaries — and to
take care of the calendar.

But her knowledge of diet and her
skill at preparing unheard-of dishes
soon won for her the enviable position
of Supervisor of Culinary Arts.

“You’re both coming up in the
Babylonian world,” Kish remarked.

“And why not?” I commented. “We
may be foreigners, but Betty’s heart
and soul are right here in Babylon — ”

“No!” Betty exclaimed. “I want to
go back homel”

“Home?” I said, in blank surprise at
her outburst. “Do you mean Borbel?”

“I mean home,” she said. “My own
land — my own times ! ”

I stared at her in amazement. She
suddenly gave way to tears.

I couldn’t have been any more sur-
prised if Slaf-Carch had whispered in
my ears. There she sat sobbing, like a

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

child. At this moment she was a child.

j^EITHER Kish nor I knew how to
handle an emergency of this kind, ’
but Kish quickly excused himself, and
I sort of brushed her eyes with my
handkerchief. Then my arms were
around her and I was kissing her.

That moment would have cost me a
visit to the lions’ dens if Jipfur had
burst in on us. But he didn’t, thank
Marduk and all the little gods! And
so, out of that unfinished breakfast,
came a new understanding — and for a
short moment a new plan of action.

“Betty, if I just had a timetable of
the return trips, we’d get aboard the
first train.”

I shouldn’t have said it, for I only
brought back the hopelessness of our
situation more cruelly. But then and
there Betty told me something that of-
fered a tiny clue — not what you’d call a
floodlight of hope, but a spark.

The time device had appeared before
her eyes once — possibly twice — since
she had been stranded here. It had
happened two years ago — she had seen
the hoops of light flash down on a hill-
top. And again, not so many months in
the past, she had seen a midnight flash
descend to the top of the Tower-of-
Babel ziggurat that might have been —
“The rule, you know,” she said, “was
that the time device would seek out the
highest points of a landscape.”

“I’ve no doubt the thing has hopped
all over the Fertile Crescent. But how
we’re going to know when and where — ”
“It’s really quite impossible,” she
said. “I needn’t have mentioned it.”
And with that our spark of hope
burnt out. We scarcely mentioned the
matter again, though Betty once
alluded to her momentary weakness as
a silly fear that she might get appendi-
citis or have to have a tooth pulled —
and she hated Babylonian doctors. But

concerning her real fear — the growing
terror of Jipfur — she said not a word.

There was one thing that I knew to.
do, and I did it.

My new position ranked me high
above the common slave I had once
been, and invested me with the author-
ity to employ personal servants. I
handpicked a dozen men, gave them a
clear description of the luminous time
hoops that might come out of the sky
— much to their bewilderment — and
stationed them on hilltops and ziggur-
rats to keep watch, maintaining day and
night shifts.

From month to month I checked up
on them, rewarding the alert ones, dis-
charging the indolent. At last I had a
faithful staff who understood what was
wanted. Years might pass, but if ever
the time hoops began to strike in this
vicinity, these men would break their
necks to get word to me.

Betty had a case of homesickness
that was pitiful to see. Perhaps it all
stemmed from her fear of Jipfur. Every
new square she chopped off the calendar
sharpened her dread of Babylon,
quickened her hopes of going back
“home.”

(~XN THE day we secretly designated
^ as Christmas she was deep in the
blues. For three years she’d passed
Christmas without giving it a thought —
a natural thing, considering that the
first Christmas was still five and a
half centuries in the future.

But this time nostalgia had her in its
morbid grip, and she couldn’t free her-
self until she resolved to do something
about it — something to express good
will — even to her worst enemies— in the
old familiar Christmas spirit.

I had a bright idea that we give gifts,
and I went to no end of trouble to fix up
something very special. Out of the best
metals and chemicals I could bring to-

BULL MOOSE OF BABYLON

gether I constructed a small but power-
ful dry cell battery — one that would fit
the vocoder. (I thought it was high
time for the ghost of Slaf-Carch to
break his long silence 1) Imagine my
consternation, a week after “Christ-
mas,” to discover that Betty had
emptied half of the battery’s contents
and was trying to grow a hothouse
flower in it.

She gave Kish and me each an ivory
comb — really fine gifts for these times.
She bestowed trinkets on several of her
palace friends. But most oddly, she
took great pains in carving a small neck
ornament for Jipfur. From a thin sheet
of brass she made a chain of letters
that spelled “Bull Moose.” Of course
only she and I knew the meaning of the
ornament, though we tried to share the
joke with Kish.

From then on Jipfur always wore the
neck piece, though ignorant of its mean-
ing. It was comical to see him try to
restrain his immense pride. He was so
sure this signified a growing bond of
love between him and his yellow-haired
slave girl that Betty suffered weeks of
bitter regret for her overflow of good
will.

Rumors began to fly. It was quite
possible, by Babylonian law, for a girl
to be lifted out of slavery if any free
man cared, to marry her. Perhaps Jip-
fur had postponed his assignment of the
yellow-haired foreign girl last fall for
a very special reason !

The more I heard of this talk the
more anxious I was to see the red flash
of time-hoops.

T'HERE was just enough winter in
A this semitropical valley for the more
savage side of civilization to hibernate.
But the warm winds of planting time
soon unleashed the furies of Babylon’s
pent-up frictions.

A storm of distressing news swept

into our palace. There was talk that
Jipfur’s Borbel estate was slipping out
of his control, that many of Slaf-
Carch’s old slaves were getting out of
hand.

And there was stronger talk — whis-
pering that Jipfur had never washed
the bloodstains from his hands, and the
gods were growing angry.

Even his staunchest friends who had
shouted his innocence from the house-
tops admitted that he had been crim-
inally negligent about the matter. He
should have at least forced a conviction
and execution upon some promising
suspect.

These gruesome suggestions, I am
sure, took root in Jipfur’s imagination.
The evidence cropped up unexpectedly
one morning.

It was one of those dismal mornings
with slow rain dripping rhythmically
along the arcade of the inner garden.
Betty and Kish and I had agreed at
breakfast that nothing ever happened
on a day like this.

What might have happened, an hour
later, if I hadn’t chanced to walk past
the library, will never be known. Cross-
ing through this secluded corner of the
palace I heard a clatter of clay tablets.
I rushed in. Strangely there were no
candles burning — the only light filtered
through the closely packed shelves of
Babylonian literature along the narrow
windows.

Jipfur stood squarely before the
shelves with a sturdy shepherd’s crook
in his hands. He was using the crook-
end on the stacks of clay tablets, jerk-
ing them down. A heap of them were
broken on the floor, and out of that
heap came a painful groan.

“Kish!” I cried.

Jipfur whirled on me, swung the
shepherd’s crook at my head. I ducked.
The thing struck the wall and more
plates of clay clattered to the floor.

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

Before I could catch any meaning
out of this mad turmoil, Jipfur was
bouncing tablets off my head and I was
rushing him with fists. A missile cut
me across the forehead and for an in-
stant I thought I would join Kish and
the rubbish heap on the floor. I sank
for a count of three — my hand closed
over a four pound slab of dried clay —
my fingertips caught it Up by its fancy
cuneiform indentations — my arm let
it fly.

That tablet may have been the Code
of Hammurabi, for all I know. If it
was, I broke the law. I broke it over
the bull moose’s brawny elbow. He
yowled with pain.

“Guards! Guards!” he shrieked,
and he waved his hands so defense-
lessly that I stopped my. attack.
“Guards! Guards!”

T^ISH stopped groaning, shook off a
quarter-ton of debris and raised
his head. One eye was swollen shut,
the other was wide open.

“Yes! Call the guards!” Kish’s
choked voice was bitter, mocking. “Call
the guards. Tell them what happened.”

Jipfur’s face was strange to see. It
was a study in terror. Jipfur, the
mighty pat'esi, the man of wealth, the
patriot with the big voice, the leader of
parades! He clutched the shelf with
quivering hands, his white lips trem-
bled.

“I’m sick!” he hissed.

Heavy footsteps were pounding to-
ward us. The guards were coming on
a run. Ota the instant Jipfur sprang
toward a certain object near the door
— a fresh, soft clay tablet still gleaming
with moisture. He hurled it to the floor,
stamped on it with his sandals to ob-
literate the writing.

In came a squad of guards, puffing
and snarling, ready with battle axes.
What was the matter? Had there been

a fight?

“Did someone attack you, your hon-
or?"

Jipfur’s eyes turned to Kish, slowly,
calculating the delicate balance of ad-
vantages.

“There has been a trifling accident,
men,” he said In an unruffled voice.
“Help that poor fellow up.”

Kish was nearer dead than alive as
two of the guards led him away. But
he distinctly echoed the word, “Acci-
dent!” under his breath — and it was
not a kindly echo.

As for the bull moose, he now lapsed
into the luxury of raving and ranting
like a mad man.

“I’m sick! I’m sick! Take me to
my bed and let the gods have mercy on
me. These crashing walls have struck
a dreadful malady through my bones.”

They led him away, and the whole
palace spent the rest of the week pray-
ing for him — at his command.

Personally, I had no fear about his
pulling through. His injuries amounted
to no more than a cracked elbow and
some bruises. There would have been
a cracked skull if I had had more time.
But he had taken such a quick escape
to mock-illness that my good work had
been cut short.

Babylon gossip took his story at face
value, namely that the rain had loos-
ened the library walls and caused his
stores of tablets to fall on himself and
his attendant.

But Kish had another story for Betty
and me, as he lay bandaged, fighting
death.

The rain, he said, had played its part,
but in a different way. A high pile of
clay tablets might have killed him in-
stantly. But the dampness stuck some
of them and bungled the patesi’s neat
plan.

“I caught a glimpse of that freshly
written document,” said Kish, referring

BULL MOOSE OF BABYLON

to the wet tablet that the bull moose
had so hastily stamped out. “It bore
my seal — Jipfur had faked it — and it
confessed that I had murdered Slaf-
Carch to give my dear master more
wealth. Now the painful memory of
the deed drove me to take my own life.”

“Your dear master!” Betty said with
a saccharine whine. “He’d better not
know that you know.”

“He knows,” said Kish weakly. “He
has warned me that If I breathe a word
to anyone, he’ll cut my heart out.”

CHAPTER VII

me a new doctor!”

That, as the newscasts of Baby-
lon went, was the quotation of the week.
Friends would meet on the streets of
Babylon and inquire about each other’s
health, and their wives’ health, and the
king’s health. When they got around
to a certain wealthy young patesi’s
health the conversation picked up in-
terest.

“I hear he called in three new phy-
sicians.”

“Three! He had all of twelve. He’s
calling doctors from all corners of the
land. I think he’s crazy”

“I think he’s guilty ”

And then the conversation would
hush down, for it didn’t become com-
mon people to make charges that they
didn’t have the money to prove.

Kish absorbed all the antiseptic that
Betty and I could concoct, and finally
got back on his feet.

Jipfur, meanwhile, grew steadily
worse.

On the day that I led Kish in for a
visit, the bull moose was carrying on
like a maniac. His attendants couldn’t
quiet him.

“If you came in to accuse me, get
out!” he would roar.

“We didn’t,” said Kish mildly. “We

came to see how you were.”

“You can’t tell me I was in the gar-
den that night,” the bull moose went
on. “There was no one in that garden.
Old Slaf-Carch stoned himself to death,
that’s what happened.”

The doctor tried to soothe him. “No
one’s accusing you. Stop making wor-
ries for yourself. Take some of these
herbs — ”

“Marduk strike fire through your
herbs!” Jipfur would shout. “I don’t
want medicine. I want the hot flames
removed from my head.”

The doctors couldn’t work with him.

That day Jipfur took a strange no-
tion that men of magic might help. He
ordered me to ride forth and find the
Serpents. Not the last three, for they
knew no magic; they were nothing but
artists at badgering and threatening.

“Find my first two Serpents. Yes,
and that hunch-backed Third. We’ll
see whether their magic is good. Bring
each of them here — by force if neces-
sary.”

Outside the palace I was at the mercy
of the motley street crowds. The hard
feelings toward Jipfur would surely be
hurled at me. I expected to be mobbed
and lynched.

But my reputation ran ahead of me
— I was the pale-faced young foreigner
that Slaf-Carch had befriended. I must
be left unharmed.

T SPENT three days chariot-cruising
through farms on the Borbel side of
Babylonia. I picked up the trail of the
First Serpent several times, but failed
to find him.

The Second Serpent walked into my
path and I carted him back to the pal-
ace. In all his rags and filth he pranced
into Jipfur’s presence with an out-
landish air of showmanship. He got
out a bagful of magic boxes and colored
feathers, and uncorked a rigmarole of

100

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

incantations to unheard of gods, chang-
ing his facial mask with every change
of gods.

The more the Serpent prayed and
pranced, the worse Jipfur felt.

“Get out! I’ve had enough. Go
back and hound the people. That’s all
you fakirs are good for.”

I stalled the fellow at the door to ask
him a question. His magic boxes had
reminded me of the vocoder and my
foolishness in trading it off to a Baby-
lonian junk man. I described the thing
from all angles. But the Second Ser-
pent had never seen it.

I ran across Serpent Number Three
in a busy market place. I recognized
him by his enormous hunch-back; com-
ing closer, I saw the grotesque mask of
black-and-white circled eyes that I had
remembered from my first glimpse of
the trio in the marshes. Those ring-
eyes had since become a familiar face
to me from public meetings and parades
that brought rich and riff-raff together.

Serpent Number Three was en-
grossed in a cracker-barrel discussion
of Babylonia’s economic system when
I interrupted him. He turned his frozen
ring-eyes on me. I wondered whether
he was grinning or scowling inside the
mask.

He came.

“Very fancy,” he commented, as we
drove up to the front entrance of the
palace. “You know we Serpents al-
ways enter through the tunnels under
the inner court.”

“You’re more than a Serpent today,”
I said. “If you can tell Jipfur what’s
wrong with him you’re more than a
doctor.”

As he hobbled out of my chariot I was
amused at myself for having been so
chatty with such a ragged creature —
but after all, he was reasonably clean,
and that set him apart from the other
Serpents.

T WATCHED him ascend the steps

past the scowling guards. For a
man handicapped not only with a huge
misproportioned back but also a peg
leg, he carried himself with a remark-
able bearing.

Again I mused upon my vagaries of
sympathy, for a Serpent — indeed, it was
admiration. However illogical, I began
to wonder whether he might have a
brand of magic up his sleeve that would
shake Jipfur out of his nervous break-
down.

But by the time I had turned my
chariot over to the stable slaves and en-
tered the palace, it was all over for the
Third Serpent. He had shot his wad,
point-blank, and blasted Jipfur into an
unholy rage.

Six guards with gleaming battle axes
marched him down to a dungeon and
locked him up.

I turned to Kish. “How in the name
of Marduk did he earn a jail term?”

“He said that Jip fur’s trouble came
from trying to carry too big a weight,”
said Kish. “He said the weight was
black guilt.”

“That Serpent is nobody’s fool,” I
said. “I wonder what he’s up to.”

“He’s done,” said Kish. “The big
boss booked him for an early execution
— on religious grounds.”

I gave up expecting any help from
doctors and men of magic, though I
went on searching fruitlessly for Ser-
pent Number One. For more reasons
than one Jipfur was anxious to see him.

One day I returned to the palace to
discover that a famous Egyptian wise
man, sojourning with the Babylonian
king, had paid a call to Jipfur, made
the perfect diagnosis, prescribed the
perfect cure.

A fanfare of trumpets called all the
officials of the palace into assembly, and
Jipfur himself marched before us to
announce the great news. The room

BULL MOOSE OF BABYLON

101

grew tense with silence. Obviously the
Egyptian wise man had struck upon
something vital, for Jipfur was almost
his old self again — straight, brittle, ar-
rogant.

“The flames that have tortured me
are subsiding,” he said. “The gods be
praised, I have been visited by one who
saw through my troubles. I must break
down a barrier which Slaf-Carch built
before me.”

Kish, sitting beside me at the rear of
the room, whispered, “Here it comes I”

“That barrier has been a trap for
me. Some men can live in traps, but
not Jipfur.”

He filled his chest, tossed his head
insolently.

“All my life I have won everything
I sought, I have wanted for nothing.
In order to be myself I must never
want for anything. To live, I must re-
move the barrier. That is what the
wise man from Egypt told me. I shall
obey him.”

Jipfur paused for a brief breathless
moment. Then —

“No matter what the voice of Slaf-
Carch has said — no matter what his
voice may say — tomorrow I shall marry
the yellow-haired foreigner girl named
Betty.”

A loud and boisterous cheer thun-
dered through the room, and dignitaries
leaped to their feet to call for drinks
and feasts.

I moved involuntarily toward the
nearest exit, but Kish caught my arm
and whispered, “Wait. Don’t hurry
away. You’ll be seen. Besides, I’ve
already taken care of everything.”

CHAPTER VIII

“VP'OU’RE no chariot driver,” Jipfur
snarled at me. “It’s no wonder
you never found the First Serpent.”

“Yes, your honor,” I said.

“At the rate you’re going, you’ll
never overtake her. She could outrun
us on foot.”

“Yes, your honor.”

“Give me those reins. I’ll show' you
how to drive. I’ll wager in your for-
eign land the people travel no faster
than the turtle crawls.”

“Very true, your honor,” I said.
Jipfur whipped up the horses, our
chariot hummed along at a merry gait.
He grumbled because Kish wasn’t able
to attend him on this job. Only a
cursed weakling, he growled, would let
a few sore spots keep him off duty so
long.

For my part, I was quite content to
make this wild-goose chase, as long as
Kish would keep Betty hidden. That
was his clever scheme — and he’d
planted the trail so skillfully that the
bull moose was sure he would overtake
her somewhere beyond Borbel.

“We’ve got to find her today,” Jipfur
said for the twentieth time. “The peo-
ple mustn’t know that she’s run away.
She’d never live it down!”

Actually, Betty hadn’t run away. At
this moment she was hiding in the tun-
nels below the palace.

But that hiding place couldn’t last
long. Slaves were continually at work
through these tunnels, carrying water
for the fountain reservoirs. There were
Serpents Four, Five, and Six — Jipfur’s
confidential men — who entered at ir-
regular intervals by these subterranean
passages. And there was Serpent Num-
Three, of the hunch-back and wooden
leg, a prisoner in an underground dun-
geon. He occupied a dangerous vantage
point. How much he had seen of our
clandestine maneuvers, how much he
would tell to the guards was another
mountain of worry.

“Take these reins,” Jipfur snapped.
“I’ve got things to think about. How
can I think when I’m driving?”

102

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

I took the reins and Jipfur ordered
me to drive straight into Borbel.

“We’ll pick up the First Serpent
while we’re at it,” he said. “He’ll help
us catch that runaway girl.”

“Where will we find hirii?”

“Right in the center of town. I can
spot him in a street crowd as far as I
can see.”

As it happened, Jipfur made his boast
good.

We slowed up approaching a large
crowd at the foot of the Borbel zig-
gurat. The center of attraction was the
First Serpent.

He stood on the first level of the zig-
gurat making a speech. The crowd was
so engrossed that no one noticed our
approach.

“I’ve told you I want to confess 1” he
yelled. “By the gods, I’m going to con-
fess 1 No matter what happens to me
— or to someone else — I’ll be glad I’ve
confessed!”

A hard gasp escaped Jipfur’s lips.

“The night it happened,” the First
Serpent continued, as his spellbound
audience leaned forward eagerly, '“ev-
erything was pitch-dark. We ap-
proached the garden on foot — two of us
• — my master and I — ”

“Quick!” Jipfur whispered to me.
“Swing the chariot around . . . Care-
ful! ... Now — drive back to Babylon
as fast as you can go!”

We slipped out of Borbel without
creaking a wheel. Then we flew — and
I mean flew. And Jipfur never said a
word about the people in my foreign
country being slow.

All he said was, “Help me into the
palace, Hal. I’m sick!”. . .

HpHAT night it was all over Babylon
— -the biggest news story of, the
year: A Serpent had confessed before
all Borbel. He had described precisely
how he and his master— no other than

the celebrated young patesi, Jipfur—
had murdered Slaf-Carchl And the
minute he had finished his speech the
civil authorities had seized him, and
burned him in a public bonfire!

Now the throngs were gathering out-
side the palace of Jipfur, clamoring for
him to appear and make his confession.

Torchlight parades circled round and
round. Shouting and rhythmic catcalls
rang through the streets.

Every life inside the palace was in
danger. If this savage multitude turned
to mob violence, Jipfur’s friends and
foes alike would be trampled under foot
or caught in racing flames.

Jipfur’s order to his guards to “Dis-
perse those howling idiots!” was no
more effective than the barking of a
dog. The guards shrugged in dismay.
Their huge battle axes turned awk-
wardly in their hands. Though they
had served Jipfur and his aristocratic
sister all their lives, this ordeal shook
their loyalties to the roots.

Jipfur’s sister said she would walk
out on the steps and cry her brother’s
innocence. Never had her queenly dig-
nity failed to impress the masses of
common people.

But the proud sister advanced only
one step outside the door, when a
shower of clods and eggs and stones
brought her back, wailing like a
spanked child.

The dignitaries put their heads to-
gether for one of their briefest con-
ferences on record. They watched fur-
tively as the street crowds gathered
material for a bonfire ; they talked busi-
ness fast. In a moment they came up
with their version of a bright idea.

They crowded around Jipfur, who
was standing back among the pillars of
the central hallway between trembling
attendants bearing lighted candles.

“We’ve got it,” said one of the dig-
nitaries. “The mob wants violence.

BULL MOOSE OF BABYLON

103

We’ll give them violence. They want
another life to pay for Slaf-Carch. We’ll
give them another life. We’ll give them
your prisoner— the Third Serpent.”
Jipfur nodded and turned to me, his
eyes bugging with terror.

“Bring up the Third Serpent.” He
handed me the key.

I knew what he meant: I should get
a squad of guards to bring up the Ser-
pent. But I had ideas of my own.

T PICKED up a lighted candlestick
and skipped down the dark stairs.
The echoes of the palace turmoil grew
fainter. I hurried through the under-
ground passages, came to the hub of
several subterranean avenues, one of
which led to the row of prison cells.

My candle cast broad stripes of sha-
dows beyond the iron bars. I caught
sight of the black and white circles of
eyes — the mask of the Third Serpent.
In the darkness I could not see his de-
formed, crippled figure — only his
ghastly mask. He clacked across the
stone floor on his peg leg to meet me.

I rushed on past his door.' But my
curious wisp of admiration for this
strange creature stopped me. I went
back and unlocked his prison bars.

“I’m taking a chance on you,” I said.
“They want you upstairs. They want
to throw you to the howling mob. But
I’m turning you free. Watch your step.”
“And what happens to you,” he
asked, “when you fail to deliver me?”
“I’m leaving,” I said. “While the
mob howls — that’s the time for me to
get away.”

“Alone?” he asked sharply.

Again I had that frantic urge to jerk
his mask off — and see his hidden ex-
pression.

“Not alone,” I said. “I’m taking the
yellow-haired girl — and possibly Kish.”
“Let me go with you, Hal,” he said.
“You’ll need me before you get to

Egypt.”

“How’d you know — ”

“It’s the only safe way to go, if you
mean to get out of Jipfur’s reach.”

“Yes, of course. But as to your
coming—”

I hesitated, trying to bring myself to
a decision. I thought of Betty — of the
stormy night we once spent in a cave
beside the Euphrates, not knowing that
this ragged, grotesque, circle-eyed crea-
ture, of magic was there too.

“Very well,” I said shortly. “Follow
us when we leave. Meanwhile you’re
on your own.”

Two avenues further on I rapped at
a musty wooden door.

Betty was there, never more beauti-
ful than by candlelight. Two girls —
confidantes from her kitchen staff —
were with her. Kish had brought them
warning of the impending mob attack a
few minutes earlier. From their fright-
ened expressions they must have
thought everyone upstairs was being
murdered by this time.

I spoke in English.

“Betty, it’s time we made a run for
it. Egypt. We’ll get Kish if we can.
And there’ll be another — a bodyguard.”

Betty shook her head slowly, dazedly.

“We’ll go . , Her English words
came forth like measured notes from
low, soft chimes. “But not to Egypt.”

“What do you mean?”

“Have you seen Kish?” she asked.

“Not recently — why?”

“He received a message — for you.
One of your watchers — on the great
ziggurat — ”

“ The time machine !” I gasped.

Betty nodded. “It came this after-
noon — and left us this”

CHE pressed the octagonal plate of
glass in my hand. A paper message
was fixed between the transparent
layers. It was a note signed by Colonel

104

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

Milholland. It read:

“/ am still trying to bring you back
from the past. I will rotate through
several locations making two stops in
each place, twenty-jour hours apart.
The time machine will come again to-
morrow on the exact hour and in the
exact spot that it deposits this glass
plate today.

Colonel Milholland”

I crept up the stairs muttering to my-
self about Joshua.

They say that Joshua once managed
to make the sun stand still. If I could
only have been blessed with that power,
inverted , maybe you think I wouldn’t
have sent Old Sol spinning around to
tomorrow afternoon!

What a jam I had let myself into by
freeing that hunchbacked Serpent. To-
morrow afternoon would never come for
me, I thought. If those dignitaries still
wanted someone to throw to the hungry
mob, they were sure to think of me —
after what I had done!

To my surprise I heard no hooting
and howling of mobsters as I crossed
the central hall. A chill of terror struck
me. That silence must mean something
dreadful.

Even when you’ve been thrown in
with a brutal, conceited scoundrel like
Jipfur, and you’ve hated his every deed,
somehow it gets you, nevertheless, to
think that good recent fellow-humans
have turned on him and burned him at
the stake.

But my tender sentiments were pre-
mature. I had under-estimated Jipfur’s
cleverness. As a patesi he was supposed
to stand arm-in-arm with the Babylo-
nian gods, and he probably knew just
how far he could depend upon them in
a crisis.

Somehow he and the dignitaries had
got the torchlight multitude under con-
trol during my absence. The idea of
throwing them a prisoner to burn had

obviously been discarded. Jipfur was
out on the steps making a speech.

I crept to the window and listened.

“In the name of Shamash, in the
name of Marduk, in the name of Ishtar,
I present myself before you. I have
declared myself innocent of the das-
tardly deed with which a certain human
Serpent tried to link my good name.

“But let my innocence be declared
not by myself, nor by you, nor by any
man. Let my innocence be declared by
the gods.

“Tomorrow at high noon I shall
ascend the steps of the king’s palace and
stand upon the plaza for all to see me.
Then and there, let the gods strike me
dead if I have ever been guilty of rais-
ing a hand to kill or to hartn one of my
fellow men.”

CHAPTER IX

WAS nearly noon.

Betty and I hurried toward the
great ziggurat.

The wide inclined path up to the first
level was like a street, always alive with
pedestrains. A few yards up we
stopped, gazed down over the edge.

“There’s your flat-headed little pet-
rified man,” I said.

Betty smiled wistfully. “I suppose
we’ll never see him again. . . . But
I’ll believe in that legend — forever!”

“Why don’t you look many times
upon the river?” came a familiar voice.

We turned, and Betty shuddered,
catching my arm. It was the Third
Serpent, his mask of encircled eyes as
impenetrable as ever. I hadn’t ex-
pected ever to see him again.

“I thought you were going to leave,
Hal,” he said, shifting his huge back
uncomfortably.

“We are,” I said, “but not for Egypt.
We must hurry on.”

“When you come down from the

BULL MOOSE OF BABYLON

105

tower,” he said, “I must thank you for
freeing me.”

“We won’t be coming down,” said
Betty, smiling mysteriously. We con-
tinued our ascent.

The Third Serpent hobbled along fol-
lowing us all that way to the third level
and there, as we looked down over the
sprawling city, he approached us again.

“Of course you won’t leave Babylon,”
he said, “until you know whether Jip-
fur is guilty or innocent of a murder.”

“We can’t wait,” I said.

“I myself am very curious to know
what the gods will say,” said the Ser-
pent. “The lives of several thousand
people will be affected one way or an-
other. If the gods should strike him
down — ”

“Don’t worry,” I laughed. “With all
due respect to the gods, I’m sure Jipfur
knows what he’s doing.”

It was a long steep climb, and we
rested again on the fifth level. That left
two more to go.

Betty frowned as she looked down
on the glazed brick buildings.

“I see the king’s palace,” she said,
“but where is the crowd?”

I didn’t know. I had supposed the
plaza would be packed with a vast mul-
titude. Was it possible that Jipfur had
slid out of his proposition to stand be-
fore the gods?

“On top of the ziggurat is the palace
to stand before the gods,” said the
Third Serpent. “That’s why so many
people have been passing us. Most of
th£ crowd is ahead of us.”

“Ahead of us!” I was already dizzy
from the four hundred and fifty feet of
climbing. This remark gave me a
whirling sensation as if I were spiralling
down on a roller coaster.

“The king changed the place of the
test,” said the Third Serpent, adding in
the same dry voice. “Why are you sud-
denly hurrying?”

“You wouldn’t understand,” I said.
“But we’ve got a certain spot reserved.
We’ve got to get there — and — and
clear it!”

HpHE Third Serpent was right, the
crowd was ahead of us, a good five
thousand strong — an ample number to
witness Jipfur’s challenge to the gods.

The ceremony was already in pro-
gress. The five thousand spectators sat
close-packed on the brick floor — a vast
circle of sky gazers, their eyes intent
on the big fluffy clouds that passed—
almost low enough to touch.

Jipfur was looking up, too, shouting
into the heavens, calling the names of
the Babylonian deities, challenging
them brazenly.

“Come, Shamash, if you have any
accusations against me, strike me with
lightning. Come, Ishtar — ”

I saw the anxiety flash through
Betty’s face. She Imew it must be
only a matter of minutes until our de-
parture.

Very well, in a few minutes we would
be ready. The watchman had told us
the exact point where the glass mes-
sage had been deposited. We had only
to take a few measurements —

But how could we? This vast throng
packed every inch of circumfrence
around the tower-top !

“Quick!” Betty whispered. “We’ve
got to disregard them.”

I knew she was right. I forced my
way through to a specified point at the
outer edge, tried to take measured
steps across the thicket of spectators.

“Down! Down !” the people hissed.
They were intent on the show at the
center of the ring. Jipfur was waving
his arms, bellowing into the skies.

Betty moaned, “We’ve got to wait.
Maybe they’ll leave soon.”

“I’m afraid not,” I said. “The bull
moose means to keep it up till he wears

106

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

them out. Listen to him!”

“Strike me down, if you dare, Oh
Marduk! Stab me with fire if I have
ever been guilty of an unkind deed!”

He tossed his pudgy head from side
to side. The wavy locks beneath his
cone-shaped cap fluttered in the breeze.
The brass necklace, “Bull Moose,”
dangled from his throat, swinging with
each boastful beckon of his arms.

“In their blindness,” Jipfur roared,
“my fellowmen have accused me of
murdering Slaf-Carch, my beloved
uncle. If I did this deed, strike me
dead this inst — ”

It came ! It flashed down out of the
sky — a veritable spiral of lightning.
Five thousand people caught the quick
glimpse — a cylinder of red fire!

Then it was gone.

Betty clutched my hand and I felt
the awful throb of disappointment in
her grip. Our chance had come and
gone — and here we sat, helpless, sur-
rounded by five thousand Babylonians,
viewing the sham-religious antics of
Jipfur—

What had happened?

Jipfur was lying down, motionless —
but not all of him. Only the lower half
of his body was there. The top half
was gone!

XTO BLOOD ran, no muscles
twitched, there was no life in that
weird looking mass of trunk, hips, and
legs. But the rest of the body — chest,
arms, and head — had vanished with the
flash of heavenly fire.

“Jipfur! Jipfur l”

Scores of voices called the name at
once, but the shrill cry of the patesi’s
haughty sister rang out above the rest.
Several persons started toward the
grotesque, lifeless object, then drew
back in fear and trembling. Hundreds
of people began to mumble prayers
aloud.

Suddenly, above the welter of excited
clamoring, an old familiar voice
sounded, loud and clear. It was the
never-to-be-forgotten voice of Slaf-
Carch.

“Today the gods have spoken!”

A chorus of murmurs echoed the
words, like a chant. Then there was a
tense silence of waiting, broken at last
by a throbbing outcry from Jipfur’s
sister.

“Speak on, Slaf-Charch! We are
listening.”

Again the voice of Slaf-Carch spoke
and as his gentle words came forth,
Betty’s hand, held tightly in mine,
ceased to tremble.

“Today Jipfur has been taken from
you,” said the voice. “Let his passing
bring peace to all who were once my
laborers and my slaves. I am still with
you in spirit. My helpers may carry on
for me if they are willing. Even those
of you who have come from a foreign
land — and a foreign time — may find
your ultimate place here. If you be-
lieve in me, stay and become my chosen
leaders.”

T) ETTY and I were among the last to
descend the lofty tower that after-
noon. There was so much to talk about,
so much to plan. Somehow Slaf-
Carch’s words made the world look
fresh and new for both of us, now that
all Betty had feared and dreaded was
gone.

“As long as you’re here, Hal,” she
said, looking up at me, starry-eyed, “I
don’t care whether I ever go back to
the twentieth century.”

“What?” I said with a wink.
“Haven’t you any feelings for your poor
uncle, the Colonel?”

“The Colonel!” Betty laughed.
“We’ve sent him a bull moose. What
more could he ask? . . .”

BULL MOOSE OF BABYLON

107

QNE day after Betty, Kish and I
had gotten the business reor-
ganization of Borbel palace well under
way — Jipfur’s sister having generously
honored us with managerial responsi-
bilities and a share of ownership— I in-
vited the Third Serpent to come in for
an interview.

He closed the door behind him,
settled his misshapen back within a
comfortable chair, and apparently
stared at me through his ring-eyed
mask.

I said, “I’ve been looking over the
records. You are fairly new to this
Serpent clique, I see.”

“I joined early last fall, shortly be-
fore you and Jipfur met us by the
marsh.”

“This job of gouging peasants for
money apparently didn’t agree with
you. You were very easy on them, I
find.”

“You are welcome to fire me,” said
the Third Serpent dryly, “if my work is
unsatisfactory.”

“I’ve fired the others,” I replied. “In
your case, however, certain other serv-
ices are not to be overlooked. You are
deserving of something over and above
a Serpent’s salary. Have you ever con-
sidered taking a vacation to — say, the
twentieth century?”

The Third Serpent gave a gurgling
chuckle and settled more comfortably
in his chair. “As a matter of fact, I
have. I’d like to go back for a ’facial
surgery job sometime — ” he supple-
mented his smooth Babylonian words
with a sprinkling of English — “some-

« MONSTER

IN reading Fantastic Adventures you doubt-
*■ lessly must sometimes doubt the credence of
the strange doings in some of the stories, but don’t
be too quick to do your doubting because there
is plenty of scientific proof on hand to back
up the authenticity of these yams.

Take, for example, Castoroides, or giant beavers
that lived in North America some odd 1,000,000
years ago. These beavers reached a length of
six feet and were the largest rodents ever to

time after the Colonel grows a bit
steadier at the controls. Naturally, I’d
give anything to get out of this mask.”

“Is it — quite bad?”

The Third Serpent nodded. “I never
allow anyone to see me. Of course I
had to learn to talk all over. Does she
suspect?”

“Not at all,” I said. “The voice of
Slaf-Carch is the real McCoy with her.
You know how she loves that river
legend.”

“Childlike I” he mused. “That’s why
she’s a good Babylonian.” He rose to
go-

“That hunched back of yours, Pro-
fessor,” I said, “is it another Babylo-
nian legend?”

He laughed. “It might be some day.
I developed it the same week you traded
off the vocoder. It’s made of leather — -
detachable, of course— and a splendid
place to keep my magic. By the way,
your machine’s a wonder. It tones
down so soft that my fellow Serpents
never heard me practicing my Slaf-
Carch.”

“You were perfect. And to think
you’ve actually made Slaf-Carch live
on.”

“He deserves to live on.” He moved
to the door, then turned back. “You
won’t say anything to my daughter, of
course. If she knew, she’d want to
see me. For the present it’s better that
she believe me dead.”

“For the present,” I nodded. “But
I’ll insist that the Third Serpent be
present at our Babylonian wedding.”

BEAVERS »

live. Imagine a rat the size of a Shetland pony
and you get some idea of the size of these weird
creatures.

Now you can see that our writer, are not juat
imagining things when they speak of strange
oversized animals, gigantic rata, enormoua bats,
gargantuan gorillas, and the like; they are speak-
ing the truth and are telling you of things as,
in many cases, they actually existed, or may
some day exist. Ellery Watson.

PRIESTESS

Who was this lovely girl who spoke
of past ages as though she actually
had lived thousands of years ago?

T ERRY LEACH uttered a short
word, fervently, and pushed the
bell again.

“Well, come on, shake a leg!” he
muttered. “Think we’ve got all night?”
As a matter of fact, they had. Some-
where back in the foothills he and Mugs
had taken the wrong turning. The No-
vember fog, then, had done its part to
confuse them still more. It was only by
chance that they’d blundered onto the
lonely, ravine-cut road leading to this
isolated mansion, perched precariously
on the very edge of a canyon.

“Gleeps!” Mugs shuddered, edging
away from the dripping pines overhang-
ing the entrance, his little pig eyes dart-
ing apprehensively. “This is a rum
joint. I’d sooner face even another
Egyptian sandstorm, like that time
when your uncle — Gleeps! Give the

bell another push, Terry.”

Terry’s forefinger went out again,

109

110

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

savagely, just as the heavy oaken door
swung inward.

The woman standing in the musty
hall, holding the seven-branched can-
dlestick aloft, was old. Old. Yellow
scalp showed through her thin white
hair, her eyes seemed filmed by catar-
acts, the black stuff of her gown was
coated with gray.

Before Terry could speak, the woman
raised her free hand to her sunken lips,
then gestured outward insistently.

“Away l” she. croaked. “Away!”

She fell back a few steps, trembling
until the candles guttered, but her
filmed eyes never left Terry’s. “Away!”

Terry’s ear was assaulted by Mugs’
violent hiss. “The dame is nutsl”

Terry ignored him. “Look,” he said
to the hag, following her in, “we’re not
going to hurt you. We’ve lost our way
and — ”

There was an interruption. A blonde
girl not more than nineteen, heavy with
child, parted dusty velvet portieres at
the back of the hall, the wooden rings
from which they were hung rattling
noisily, attracting the old woman’s at-
tention.

She turned and glared so balefully at
the newcomer that the blonde drew in
her breath shudderingly, and her red-
rimmed eyes opened wide, wild with
fear.

Terry’s stomach muscles tightened.
He thought the hag was going to throw
the candelabrum at the shrinking girl.
But wordlessly the old crone raised her
yellow claw and pointed back in the di-
rection whence the girl had come.

The blonde’s head drooped. One in-
stant her awkward body was outlined
against the dingy velvet, then she was
gone. If it weren’t for the somehow
sinister swaying of the velvet folds,
Terry would have thought he’d dreamed
it all.

The old woman, mumbling, let her

hand fall to her side. Terry felt his
muscles relax. Air was in his lungs
again, but the palms of his hands were
strangely clammy.

“Goodbye now,” Mugs was mutter-
ing. “Let’s get out of here.” He kept
looking back over his heavy shoulder.
“This dump gives me the collywobbles.”

Terry’s lean cheeks rounded in a
smile. The beefy brute was actually
scared, for once in his lifel

Mugs saw the smile and straightened
defensively. “Not that I’m scared, or
anything — ” He gestured nonchalantly
to show how cool he was, and knocked
a figurine from the carved oak chest at
his side. Automatically he stooped to
retrieve it, then stiffened. “Look, Terry,
ain’t this — ”

It was a small chalcedony statue of
Bubastis, the sacred cat of Egypt,
though what in the world it was doing
here, Terry couldn’t even guess. But
he recognized that it was undeniably
genuine. He’d made one archaeological
expedition with his Uncle Ned, the well-
known Egyptologist, shortly before the
war broke out.

^T A low growl from the hag’s with-
ered lips, he hastily replaced the
figurine on the chest.

“Hey lookl” Mugs was staring up
the red-carpeted stairway that hugged
the left-hand wall, his eyes threatened
to pop from their sockets. Terry fol-
lowed the direction of his gaze, then
stiffened.

A woman was standing on the land-
ing, halfway up. But what a woman!
When she saw she’d been observed, she
commenced to descend, slowly, her feet
in golden sandals making no sound.
The peacock-green draperies of her
skirt were slit from ankle to jeweled
girdle, revealing flashes of creamy calf
and flawless thigh as she moved.

Somewhere back of Terry, Mugs was

THE ETERNAL PRIESTESS

111

moaning: “Gleepsl”

As she came into the circle of light
cast by the candles, Terry saw that her
torso was bare, golden plates hiding
her breasts. And that her eyes were
hidden by a veil that hung from an
Egyptian headdress.

For a moment Terry’s jaw hung
slackly. Tljen he threw back his head
and laughed. It was too much, this
costume coming on top of everything
else.

“Ah, there, Cleo!” he grinned. “And
how’d you leave Mark Anthony?”

The only answering laughter was
Mugs’ uncertain bray, that faded
quickly into a bleat as the veiled eyes
swept over him hostilely. Even Terry
felt some emanation from those hidden
eyes that sent an icy draught up his
long spine.

Ignoring him, she addressed the old
woman. “What is it, Ola?” The words
were blurred by an indefinable accent.

The hag cowered back and again
made that outward gesture, Away !

The girl in the Egyptian costume
shrugged, faced the men. “My house-
keeper, Mrs. Gronk, is — ” She broke
off significantly. “You seek shelter
from the coming storm, yes? Mrs.
Gronk, show the fat one to a room.”
She turned to Terry, regarded him
speculatively. “But you follow me,
please.”

“Heyl” Mugs said plaintively.
“Whaddya mean — fat one V*

She didn’t answer, but moved lithely
to still another portiered doorway and
disappeared. Terry followed, calling
over his shoulder: “Bring in the bags
from the car, Mugs. You can show the
lady your muscles later.”

Mug’s baffled snarl followed him
through the draperies.

HpERRY found himself in a long
drawing room, its ends lost in shad-

ows. The girl was standing in the
middle of a cleared space. Furniture
of every period crowded the room, and
many-branched candelabra in floor
stands guarded the keyboard of a mas-
sive ebony grand piano, sprawling its
great length across a curtained alcove.

The wind was rising. Terry could
hear it woo-hoo about the eaves. He
eyed the girl, waited expectantly.

But she just stood there in the exact
center of the turkey-red carpet, her
hands clasped before her. She, too,
seemed to be waiting. Her expression
was unfathomable.

Finally he said uncomfortably, “I’m
Terry Leach. And you — ?”

The little nose beneath the veil was
straight, exquisite; the jawline hinted
of great beauty; the unsmiling lips were
soft and warm and blood-red; the
black hair curled inward at the ends
and brushed the girl’s bare shoulders.
“They call me — T’Risha.”
“T’Risha? It’s an unusual name.”
The red lips held a hint of mockery.
“I’m — an unusual person.”

“Who are you? Why do you live
here in this isolated place?”

“I leased it because it’s remote. I
have had enough of Europe, of witnes-
sing the evil antics of my fellow-men.”
Terry frowned. “Speaking of evil
antics, your housekeeper isn’t very
prepossesing.”

T’Risha shrugged. “I keep Ola be-
cause she doesn’t talk. And even if she
did, people would think it the ravings
of a lunatic.”

Terry wanted to ask what Ola Gronk
could tell, but T’Risha then smiled
faintly, and seated herself at the piano.
It was done leisurely as if she were
playing for time, playing with him be-
fore — what? He didn’t know. But at
the first notes she struck from the yel-
lowed keyboard, he forgot his suspi-
cions, sank into a chair and listened in

112

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

amazement.

It was music the like of which he’d
never heard. It had nothing to do with
modern rhythm or melody; it was
weird, eerie, yet holding a strange note
of exaltation. And it was accompanied
by the disturbing obbligato of the rising
storm and the subdued creakings of the
ancient house.

Terry, annoyed, felt himself fighting
the spell it seemed to cast.

“What was that?” he asked when she
had finished.

T’Risha regarded her hands, still
lying on the keys. A scarab shone dully
on the index finger.

“That was the coronation music for
Nefertiti. I was her attendant.”

Terry felt more comfortable — and a
little disappointed. The girl had ef-
fectively broken this strange enchant-
ment. She was merely being ridiculous.
For Nefertiti, he remembered, lived
about 1370 B. C. Nevertheless, he
didn’t blink an eye.

“That’s nice,” he offered casually.
“Let’s see — that makes you about
thirty-three hundred years old.”

“Yes,” she said quite simply. And
didn’t smile.

HPERRY’S handsome mouth tilted.

“You’re certainly well-preserved!”
He eyed her lissome figure meaningly.

T’Risha stood up. “You misunder-
stand. It’s not my body, but my mind
that’s old. It has been transferred
from body to body for generations.”

“Just for the hell of it?”

“As a punishment — because once I
aspired to Nefertiti’s lover, thirty-three
centuries ago.” She seemed to forget
Terry, then, raised her arms despair-
ingly. “Ah, Nefertiti, how cunning
you were! How well you guessed the
horror of such a penalty! My body
ever young — my mind and my memory
weighted, sickened with the evil of the

world — appalled by the things I’ve wit-
nessed!”

Terry was staring. “You couldn’t
be nuts by any chance?”

“Nuts?”

“You know — insane.”

“Oh ! ” As he watched, the wild pas-
sion of her outburst faded. Appar-
ently she only now became aware, for
the first time, of his irony. Curiously,
she wasn’t angry. “You scoff? You
think my words merely the maunder-
ings of a diseased mind? But of course!
How could your poor modern mind en-
compass these things?”

Her contemptuous pity put him on
the defensive, even as he realized the
absurdity of it.

“‘Poor modern mind,’ boloney!” he
said inelegantly. “Look what the mod-
ern mind has accomplished in science
alone —

“ Pouf! ” She appeared genuinely
amused. “Modern science ! Those poor,
weak, misguided efforts! Why, I could
show you things that modern science
has never dreamed of — ” She broke
off, commanded sharply: “Kiss me!”

Surprised by the sharp order, he
took one step forward, then froze where
he was, instantly wary. Some trick, his
mind warned.

A strange thing happened to Terry
Leach then. Every atom of his strong
will commanded his body to remain
where it was. But slowly, irresistibly,
his legs began to carry him toward
T’Risha!

The red mouth drew him like some
lovely, evil flower. Haltingly he
moved, fighting this magnetic influence
every step of the way, his brow wet
with the effort he was making to resist.
Haltingly, his head bent and his mouth
closed down over hers and clung, the
contact blurring everything with a
crimson haze.

T’Risha had not moved a finger.

THE ETERNAL PRIESTESS

113

She drew her mouth from his. “Why
did not your modern knowledge help
you?” she asked mockingly. “See how
powerless yo\i were against thirty three
centuries of older knowledge?”

HPERRY shook his head to clear it,
A fought back a mad desire to kiss
those crimson lips again.

“Hypnotism!” he said scornfully.
But his voice shook.

She shook her head.

His hands slid down her upper arms
and held them just above the elbows.
And suddenly he knew that he must see
her eyes.

He must.

Before she could suspect his inten-
tion, he raised his hand and tore away
the veil. And instantly wished that he
had not.

She hid her eyes quickly beneath her
heavy lashes, but not before he saw
that they were long and oval, and of a
brilliant emerald green.

And they were weary as the world,
and as old and evil.

The housekeeper’s face was distorted
evilly; the silver blade of a wicked
looking knife she held threw back high-
lights from the guttering candles.

“Drop that!” T’Risha’s command
rang out, and the knife slipped to the
carpet. “Go to your room ! ”

Mrs. Gronk gestured menacingly at
the girl cowering at T’Risha’s feet.

T’Risha’s eyes narrowed angrily.
“Olal”

Mrs. Gronk wavered, pulled away
from Mugs, muttering. The brown
draperies swung to behind her.

“You go to your room, too, Ethel.”
T’Rihsa raised the shrinking girl to her
feet.

“I want to leave!” Ethel wailed.
“Why do you keep me here? I wanted
to leave — right after Jim died. Why
do you keep me here?”

The girl was dangerously near
hysteria, Terry saw, but T’Risha re-
mained cold, impassive.

“It is important that you stay. That
is enough. To your room, please.”

Terry shuddered and recoiled, de-
spite himself. Silence fell while those
unusual eyes regarded him — flatly, un-
blinkingly, like? the eyes of a cat; a
silence broken only by the howl of the
wind, a crackling from the hearth.

Then the silence was cut by a scream
that rose and fell, ululated wildly, was
cut off at its height.

The blonde girl came running in and
threw herself at T’Risha’s feet. In the
extremity of her terror, the girl couldn’t
speak. She could only gesture blindly
toward the doorway.

The curtains billowed and gyrated
madly, parted with a clash of ririgs as
Mugs came in, pushing the struggling
housekeeper before him.

“This dame is nuts!” he panted to
Terry. “She was gonna carve the little
blonde.”

'Y^HILE Ethel was making her for-
T lorn exit, Mugs wavered, deep in
what passed for thought. Terry could
almost hear the rusty machinery of his
mind squeaking. Then after a hasty
glance at T’Risha, Mugs ambled after
the blonde girl.

Terry asked, “Who was that girl?”

“The widow of my houseman. He
died five months ago.”

“And Mrs. Gronk’s attack, just now
— ?”

T’Risha frowned. “She has nour-
ished some absurd hatred for the girl,
but it means nothing. Ola’s half-mad.
But the girl must stay. My mind is
to be transferred to her child, before
dawn.”

“And how’s that little trick to be
accomplished?”

She betrayed annoyance at his sar-

114

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

casm. He saw a small crescent-shaped
scar on her forehead glow angrily red
for a moment, then fade. But the out-
burst he half-expected didn’t come.
Instead she glided silently to the hall,
was back in a minute bearing the chal-
cedony statuette of Bubastis. While
he watched, she unscrewed its head, so
cunningly fitted that the joint couldn’t
be detected at first glance.

From the body of the sacred cat,
she drew forth a flask of alabaster — of
such fragility that the dark shadow of
the liquid it contained could be plainly
seen.

“This is the Golden Philtre of Ne-
fertiti.” T’Risha’s face was a mask
impervious to Terry’s disbelief. She
might have been delivering a lecture.
“Just before Ethel is delivered of her
child, she shall drink of this. The
mind-transference is automatically ef-
fected.”

“And what do you do with your
present — uh — chassis?”

T’Risha replaced the flask. “You
shall find me dead — but my mind shall
live on in thg body of Ethel’s baby.
You will know it by this crescent mark
on the child’s forehead.” She touched
the scar.

Terry hooked one leg over a table,
and settled himself. This was going
to be good I “Now, look,” he argued
solemnly. “Just suppose I did swallow
this wild yara of yours. It’s still point-
less. The body you have is perfectly
good.” He grinned disarmingly. “In
fact, plenty of women would give their
eyeteeth for it! So why should you
just toss it aside like an old shoe? Why
start in all over again as a baby?”

T’Risha shook her head sadly. “Lis-
ten, have you never stood idly by, fum-
ing, while someone fumbled a job that
you could do much better yourself?”

“Well — yes.” He was puzzled.

“Exactly. Which is the very essence

of Nefertiti’s revenge. I, with a brain
knowing all things, must periodically
become a baby, must submit helplessly
to the maddening ministrations of
stupid, well-meaning adults. Can you
imagine a more exquisite torture?”
T’Risha paused to let that sink in,
then went on: “Cunningly, she decreed
that I should inhabit no one body for
more than thirty years. More — I
cannot end my torment. That lies be-
yond my power. For me, there can be
no dissolution until the world’s end,
unless — ”

“Yes?”

The green eyes glowed somberly.
“Nefertiti vowed that if I could find one
person who believed my story — only
one — then I might truly die, might find
peace at last. That is why I have told
you this — hoping that you might be-
lieve, that I might be free.”

Terry waved a magnanimous hand.
“Oh, well, if it means that much to you,
I believe you. I can believe anything.
I’m funny like that.”

'T' , RISHA’S body sagged wearily. “It
1 is not enough that you jocosely pro-
fess belief. You must believe — with
every cell of your mind, every drop of
your blood.”

“Sorry." Terry tried to keep his
voice properly regretful. “Fun is fun,
but that’s a pretty large order.”

T’Risha nodded as if she’d expected
no other answer. She straightened, her
face once more composed. “I have one
more thing to show you. Perhaps if
you see something that your modern
science cannot equal — But first, go to
your room and see if the fat one is
asleep. If not, tell him to stay there.
He must not follow. When this is
done, rejoin me here.”

Terry found Mugs sitting on the side
of the bed, one shoe in his hand, star-
ing off into space. He looked as if

THE ETERNAL PRIESTESS

115

he’d been sitting that way for hours.

Terry extended a hand, palm out-
ward. “Hail, fat one I”

“All-1-1 ri-i-ight, wise guy!” Mugs
scowled over his beefy shoulder.

Terry grinned. “Keep a candle
burning in the window for me, will you?
I*m going gadding with Salome. You
should hear the yarn she’s just been
telling me. Boy, with an imagination
like hers, she should be writing for the
radio. But I’m going to string along
until I find out what’s behind all this.”
“That dame is nuts,” Mugs said de-
spondently. He brightened. “But the
little blonde, now, Ethel — Say, the
first time I seen her something got me
—here” He thumped his barrel chest
resoundingly.

“What got you there?”

“Love, pal, love.” Mugs cast down
his eyes, smirked, looked very like a
coy elephant.

Terry groaned. “Now I know there’s
something wrong with this house!”

He went through the doorway two
steps ahead of the shoe Mugs hurled
at him.

HP’RISHA, wrapped in a sable cloak,
A waited for him in the drawing room.
She directed him to bring the lighted
candelabrum, and he followed at her
heels through a maze of passages at the
rear of the house. Her lovely sway-
ing shoulders preceded him down a
flight of steps leading to the basement,
down still another flight to a sub-base-
ment.

At the entrance to a long tunnel-like
corridor, seemingly carved out of solid
rock, she stopped, made as if to turn
back. But presently she went on.

The rock walls of the corridor
dripped beads of moisture that fell and
glittered like diamonds in T’Risha’s
hair. At the tunnel’s far end, they en-
tered a square-cut room. T’Risha

lighted tall candles there, and with the
aid of a candelabrum which he held
aloft, Terry saw a black velvet cata-
falque in the center of the room, bear-
ing a sheeted figure.

Something about that still figure —
the gloomy atmosphere of the room,
chill, damp — sent a thrill radng down
Terry’s spine. He waited.

T’Risha removed the sheet rev-
erently, disclosed the long slim body
of a youth, clad only in a narrow loin-
cloth of some elaborately embroidered
stuff. A moment she stood there, then
threw herself across the young man’s
breast.

“Makelon!” Her cry held all the
sorrow of the ages. “Makelon!”

Terry stirred uncomfortably, his
movement sending grotesque shadows
staggering across the rock wall.

For long moments T’Risha lay there,
sobbing quietly. But when she straight-
ened, her eyes were hard and bright and
dry. She gestured, the rings on her
fingers sending out points of light.
“What modern miracle of embalming
can equal this?”

It seemed unbelievable that she had
just been weeping. With her despair-
ing cries still echoing in his ears, Terry,
shaken, tried to speak deprecatingly.
“There’s Caruso’s body — in Italy — ”

“Ah, yes.” Wearily. “I have heard.
But cold, stark, imprisoned in a her-
metically sealed casket lest the air—”
She broke off, drew Terry nearer,
guided his free hand. “Touch!” she
commanded.

He felt his fingers curling, but he let
her place them on the young man’s arm,
felt the smooth muscles of Makelon’s
biceps give slightly under the pressure
of his fingers.

He snatched his hand back, hur-
riedly. Then, unable to help himself,
holding his breath, his hand went out
again and rested wonderingly on Make-

116

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

Ion’s chest. It was soft and warm un-
der his touch. And he saw, amazed,
that what he’d thought were cosmetics
on the young man’s face, was really the
warm color of blood, like a blush, under
the olive skin.

Slowly, Terry turned to stare into
T’Risha’s face. “Why he’s alive! He’s
warm! He isn’t dead at all ! ”

The emerald eyes bored into his.
“He is dead. He has been dead for
thirty-three centuries.”

While Terry watched, fascinated,
feeling the world revolve around him
dizzily, T’Risha replaced the sheet, her
slim hands lingering lovingly over their
task. Slowly she blew out the candles
at either side of that incredible bier.

“Come,” she said to Terry, when she
had finished.

They retraced their steps in silence.

T>ACK in the dark entrance hall,
T’Risha leaned wearily against the
newel post. 9

“Well?” Her dark eyebrows were
slim crescent moons of inquiry above
tragic eyes.

Terry was unsmiling at last. All
during the silent journey back, he’d
recognized, and resented, the fact that
his skepticism was sadly shaken by
that scene in the crypt. But now that
they were back here among relatively
accustomed surroundings, he felt all his
old disbelief returning. He found he
could even think of two reasonable ex-
planations for what he had seen iri that
cavern room beneath the house. Hyp-
nosis, of the sort associated with the
Indian conjuror’s rope trick, or — a
modern body in a state of catalepsy, in-
duced he knew not how.

But there was one other thing —
“What I don’t understand,” he said
slowly, “is the reason for all this. Now
don’t give me that mind-transference
bunk again. What do you expect to get

out of this? What game are you play-
ing?”

“So you still refuse to believe?” she
asked, and he saw the last faint ray of
hope fade from those lustrous eyes.
Her voice held only sadness. “How
arrogant you moderns are with your
paltry knowledge. How quick to flaunt
your skepticism.”

She reached up and took a candle
from the candelabrum he still held.

“It is always the same,” she said
drearily. “Always. Somehow, when I
saw you tonight, I hoped — But, no
matter. I can do no more.” Her hand
touched his cheek in a light caress of
forgiveness. “Good night, Terry Leach,
and — goodbye.”

She commenced to ascend the stairs,
the candle she held making a little pool
of light in the gloom.

Some fear born of her last words
made Terry call out, “T’Risha, wai|!”

“Yes?” She paused but didn’t turn.

“I—”

It was on the tip of his tongue to say
he believed her, but — oh, hell! Terry
Leach swallowing a fantastic yam like
this! He’d wait. In the morning
there’d be some perfectly plausible ex-
planation for T’Risha’s strange actions.
He’d probably learn her name was
something prosaic, like Mary Smith,
and that she’d been dropped on her
head as a baby.

She was still waiting, halfway up the
stairs.

“Oh — nothing,” Terry finished lame-

iy.

T’Risha resumed her ascent, and
Terry watched the graceful swaying of
her hips until the golden circle of light
from her candle vanished into the re-
cesses of the upper hall. Then, some-
where, a door closed softly.

TTS finality made Terry shiver. He
stood there at the foot of the steps

THE ETERNAL PRIESTESS

117

indecisively, savoring the almost tan-
gible aura of glamor she’d left behind
her. About him, the old house shook
and moaned, frenzied by the high gusts
of the storm that had broken at last.
Through the uncurtained windows he
could see the fogs, dispelled now by the
wind, drifting in gray tatters like shreds
of veiling. ,

Arrogance . . . skepticism, she had
said. And why not? Was he a child
to believe everything he was told? And
yet — if only she hadn’t been so damned
convincing! If only he could rid him-
self of this suspicion that he was mak-
ing a tragic mistake in not believing her.

An idea took possession of him,
brought a thoughtful look to his eyes.
Going to the chest, he removed the
alabaster phial from the body of Bu-
bastis, put it in his pocket, rescrewed
the head, and left the sacred cat where
he’d found it.

He gained his room to find Mugs
asleep, his strangled snores threatening
to blast the damask canopy from the
top of the bed.

For a moment Terry toyed with the
thought of waking him, telling him the
story. But he decided against it.
Mugs, if he didn’t accuse Terry of in-
sanity, would want to leave this mad-
house right away. And Terry knew he
wouldn’t be able to leave himself until
this thing was cleared up one way or the
other.

He slipped the flask beneath his pil-
low, divested himself of his clothes, slid
between the cold sheets. He could feel
the bulge of the alabaster bottle be-
neath his head.

Dead before morning , she had said.
But he had the Golden Philtre. If she
tried to trick him —

Ho tossed and turned, shadowed by
a nameless dread, filled with an unshak-
able sense of depression. Until finally
he threw back the covers and got up.

“Damned if she hasn’t convinced
me l” he muttered softly, jerking into
a robe.

Not that he was going to tell her so,
now. But there was something he
could do, without her knowledge. And
if he was just being a gullible sucker,
as he half-suspected— well, at least
T’Risha wouldn’t be able to laugh at
him in the morning.

Removing the flask from beneath his
pillow, Terry went out into the dark-
ened hall quietly, where only a dim light
burned. He didn’t know which was
Ethel’s room, but—

He stopped, then went forward
slowly.

/^vLA GRONK was crouching before
a door down the hall.

“What are you doing here?” Terry
whispered.

The old housekeeper lifted a face
puckered with woe, held a finger to her
lips. '

“Sh-h-hl I’m guarding the blonde
one, waiting for her to call.”

Terry scratched his head. Last night
the housekeeper seemed bent on killing
Ethel. Such dog-like devotion, now,
didn’t ring true.

But Mrs. Gronk whimpered,
“T’Risha bade me stay here. T’Risha
threatened me — ” She broke off, be-
gan to rock back and forth in misery.

Terry entered Ethel’s room without
knocking, to find her awake, sitting up
in bed. She smiled shyly when she saw
him.

He took an empty glass from the bed-
side table, poured the philtre into it.

“I’ve brought you some medicine,
Ethel. Drink!”

Trustingly she downed the potion,
handed him the drained glass. Fear
gripped him then. What if the stuff
was poison? But Ethel lay back
against her pillows tranquilly, closed

118

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

her eyes.

Terry sighed in relief, left the room.
Mrs. Gronk was still squatting there,
but she didn’t lift her head.

He paused at the door of his room,
then continued on to the staircase. Go-
ing to the lower hall, he replaced the
phial in the body of Bubastis.

Returning to his room, he slept.

tTE WOKE, in the dismal half-light
A of a gray dawn, to the rushing
sound of water teeming down the moun-
tainside, swirling past on either side.
Boulders dislodged by the flood struck
the house at intervals, shook its founda-
tions. The ancient eyrie moaned its
protests, shivered and shook under the
pounding assault.

Terry struggled to wakefulness slow-
ly. His sleep had been tortured by
hideous dreams . . . macabre figures
dancing . . . brilliant emerald eyes
taunting. The spectral shapes of un-
familiar furniture puzzled him. It was
a minute before he remembered where
he was.

He leaned over Mugs, shook him,
slapped him. Mugs struggled back to
consciousness.

“Huh?” Mugs blinked stupidly.
“Morning?” He sat up.

The door from the hall swung open,
propelled by the hand of Ola Gronk.
She stood there staring, unseeing — the
lank wisps of gray hair wild about her
leathery face.

“Death,” she whispered. "Death!"
Her talon-like hand waved toward a
door across the hall.

“The dame — ” Mugs began, almost
whimperingly. He couldn’t finish the
sentence.

Terry swore softly, jerked on his
robe. He ran past Mrs. Gronk, threw
open the door across* the hall. What
he saw there brought him up sharply,
then drew him with lagging steps.

T’Risha, dad in a long white robe,
was lying on the bed, her arras at her
sides, her strange eyes closed. Terry
bent an ear to her breast, fumbled for
her pulse. Nothing.

He whipped to the dressing table for
a small mirror, held it before the car-
mine lips. No blur of breath marred
its shining surface. The mirror slipped
from his hand.

He stared down at the crescent scar
on her immobile brow. Dimly he was
aware of the house shuddering around
him, pounded by the relentless rains.

“Death!"

Mrs. Gronk, with Mugs at her heels,
had followed him in. The hag cackled
hysterically, her eerie laughter echo-
ing in the silent room. Her faded eyes
grew cunning.

“I know,” she whispered. “The
blonde one has killed her.”

She turned and tottered with sur-
prising speed from the room. Mugs
bellowed and followed, Terry at his
heels. They caught up with her in the
next room, just as she reached the bed
there and her claws went out with
strangling motions. They dragged her
back, thrust her from the room, locked
the door.

Ethel, in alarm, had pushed herself
up on one elbow. But now she sank
back. She smiled tiredly and beck-
oned, lifting a corner of (he blanket at
her side. Mugs had eyes only for her,
but Terry found himself staring down
into the face of a new-born baby.

‘"Ip’RISHA,” Ethel whispered. “I’ve

A called her that because the other
T’Risha was kind.”

Terry, breath held, bent forward for
a closer scrutiny. On the tiny forehead
was a crescent-shaped scar 1 It seemed
to mock him.

“We’ll get you out of her,” Mugs was
assuring Ethel. “We — I’ll take care

THE ETERNAL PRIESTESS

119

of you.” The light from Ethel’s eyes
evidently overwhelmed him. He waved
a hammy hand. “Glad to do it. It’ll
be nothing. I mean — aw, nuts I” He
gave up bashfully, but his little eyes
were glowing.

Terry straightened, his thoughts rac-
ing. The sound of the flood waters, a
loud murmur before, came to his ears
now as an angry roar.

His eyes went to the baby again. And
then he was rigid, frozen. For slowly,
as he watched, the crescent scar on the
infant's brow faded and disappeared /

In that very instant there was a
sharp, rending noise, and Terry felt
himself pitched violently against the
wall. Furniture rolled crazily on its
casters, brought up against opposite
walls with a crash. There was the shrill
scream of joists tearing apart from each
other.

Terry dragged himself up from where
he’d been hurled, temporarily blinded
by blood from a deep gash over his
right eye.

Mugs was shouting hoarsely, “Terry!
The foundations are going! A land-
slide!”

Plaster fell in patches from the ceil-
ing, sending up little puffs of white dust.

Terry leaped into action. “Take
Ethel, quick! But gently.” No need
to add that last. He picked up the
wailing baby himself as Mugs lifted
Ethel from the bed, carried her easily.

'T"'HE two men with their burdens ran
across the sloping floor.

“Mrs. Gronk!” Terry shouted, above
the brittle sound of shattering glass,
the wrenching racket of tearing wood.
There was no answer. The housekeeper
was nowhere to be seen. Perhaps she’d
gone. If not, it was too late —

They ran down the stairway, bounc-
ing like a springboard now under their
feet, its supports almost gone. Through

the hall they raced and across the sod-
den ground until there were fifty yards
between them and the house. They
were not a minute too soon.

As they stopped and looked back
aghast, the house seemed to leap up-
ward. With a deafening racket, it
dissolved before their very eyes and
disappeared into the canyon.

Echoes of its crashing progress re-
verberated from the canyon walls for
long minutes after the house had ac-
tually disappeared. Then finally there
was silence, with only the gray sky
brooding low to cover its remains.

Mugs broke the silence first.
“Gleeps!” he whispered. It had the
quality of a prayer.

Ethel buried her face against his
shoulder. Terry felt his legs trembling
weakly, even though the danger was
past. The shrill wailing cry of the baby
made itself heard. Terry held her
close, and looked with stricken eyes at
where the ancient house had stood.

Whatever its secrets, it held them
now inviolably, together with Make-
Ion’s body, and T’Risha. . . .

A stab of anguish shot through Terry.
Regret and remorse pervaded his being,
were an oppressive weight in his chest.

He felt very small and unimportant
and alone. And pitifully ignorant.
What price modern knowledge now?
Could it explain T’Risha? Could it
tell him what he wanted to know?
Wasn’t it possible the ancients knew
many things beyond our ken? That in
thirty-three centuries much has been
lost?

His heart ached for the T’Risha he’d
lost, but — he had this T’Risha!

The baby squirmed in his arms. He
looked down. Yes, the scar was gone.
Had he succeeded in releasing her from
Nefertiti’s vengeance? He didn’t
know. But he’d guard this baby, watch
over her, and some day —

DOUBLE i" DEATH

by GERALD VANCE

T HE resident head of the New
York State Insane asylum
glanced from the release papers
on his desk to the tall, middle-aged,
intelligent looking man standing before
him.

“Yours has been a most interesting
case, Colegrave,” he said thoughtfully.
“Six months ago T would have staked
my professional reputation on the fact
that you were an incurable inmate.
Now,” the gray-haired alienist shrug-
ged his shoulders good-naturedly, “I
find myself in the position of signing
your release papers and offering you
my congratulations on your extremely
remarkable recovery.”

The tall, distinguished man facing
the alienist bowed slightly, and smiled.

“Thank you doctor,” he said quietly.
“You’ve done a great deal for me I

know. Now that I am ready again to
take my place in a normal world I find
myself somewhat apprehensive. Are
you quite sure that I am completely
cured?”

The alienist stood up, chuckling.

“The fact that you can ask a question
like that is the best indication that you
are cured. I can say now, Colegrave,
that when you first came into this san-
itarium, you were the most advanced
schizophrenic* I have ever observed.
Your cleavage in personality and ego
was almost absolute. Mentally, you
were two persons. Each segment of
your psyche was complete and whole
as far as will, memory and tempera-
ment were concerned. As a rule when
a person is a victim of schizophrenia
the eventual result is terrible insanity.
The two natures, the two persons you

Colegrave was that phenomenon

121

122

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

might almost say, are constantly war-
ring for supremacy, and the outcome
of such mental civil war is usually
mental anarchy. By some miracle you
escaped that fate.”

“I find it hard to believe,” Colegrave
murmured. “I can remember what it
was like when I was possessed of two
distinct personalities. I can remember
the terrible struggles that I underwent
when my dual nature was fighting it-
self. Until three months ago my life
was a living hell. Then, as you know,
after my sickness, everything was dif-
ferent. I was a well man again and,
somehow, my mental sickness was cured
too.”

The alienist shook his head, and a
puzzled line appeared over his eyes.

“It was very peculiar,” he reflected.
“That sickness, with its horrible head
pains of which you complained, ap-
parently did what the best psycholo-
gists in the nation found it impossible
to do. It destroyed the second party
of your dual nature, leaving you free
to enjoy a normal life again. Well,
such is science. Infallible to a certain
point, and then it goes just as crazy as
the best of us do sometimes.”

Colegrave shook hands with the
doctor then and walked to the door.

“Thanks again for everything,” he
said.

“Don’t mention it,” the alienist
laughed. “You did all the work your-
self.”

'TpHEN Colegrave stepped through
x the door and walked rapidly down
the gravel path that led away from the
sanitarium. When he reached the iron
gate, the doorman opened for him and
he passed through onto a dusty, little-
used road. This he followed for a mile

* Schizophrenia — A mental disease resulting
from a split personality. The victim has two na-
tures, generally diametrically opposed to each
other. — E d.

or so, perspiring freely under the warm
rays of the sun as he strode along.

At length he reached the main high-
way that led to the metropolitan sec-
tion of New York. A car was waiting
there for him and he got in.

The car moved away and Colegrave
settled back against the cushions with
a sigh of relief. The colored chauffeur
was separated from the rear seat by a
glass partition which was rolled up into
place. 'Colegrave, however, was not
alone. There was another man in the
back of the car, a sip all, cunning look-
ing man, who glanced sidewise at Cole-
grave and grinned wickedly as the cffr
gathered speed.

“We did it, didn’t we?” he smirked.
“No one has the faintest suspicion as
to what happened to you. Or maybe
I should say, what happened to me.”

Colegrave smiled, a thin, thoughtful
smile.

“Since we are really one person, it is
perfectly correct to speak of us in the
singular. When I entered their crude
sanitarium I was two persons men-
tally. Now I am two persons physi-
cally. Each of my dual natures has a
physical manifestation, controlled by
one intellect.”

The little man scratched his head.

“If we’re the same person,” he said,
frowning, “Why is it I can’t under-
stand this situation, while you can.”

“Simple enough,” Colegrave said
quietly. “Make an effort now to absorb
what I am going to tell you. It may
be important sometime. Ever since I
was old enough to reason I realized that
I possessed two distinct natures, that
I was a schizophrenic. One-half of my
nature was respectable on the surface,
but quite coldly ambitious at the same
time. This half of my nature compelled
me to seek success by conventional
means, which is the logical way for a
man of ambition to advance in the

DOUBLE IN DEATH

123

world.

“My other nature was much more
honest and direct than this respectable
side of mine. It prompted me to gain
wealth and recognition by any means
that came to hand. This second side
of mine would stop at nothing to
achieve its ends. It demanded that I
kill, that I steal, that I lie, that I do
anything which would gain wealth and
power for me.

“As a result, for the most of my life
I have been engaged in a constant inner
struggle. My respectable self would .
not object to ill-gotten gains or murder,
but it did object to the possibility of
exposure. My second half cared
nothing for the hypercritical approval
of the world. It was willing to take
any and all consequences.”

^OLEGRAVE paused and glanced at
the small, ruthlessly cunning man
who was listening avidly to every word.

“It finally became obvious,” he went
on, “that something had to be done.
When I entered the state sanitarium it
was hot by accident. I planned that
deliberately and carefully. I realized
that the only way I could achieve what
I wanted from this world, would be to
make the cleavage in my nature a
physical one, so that my two natures
could operate independently for the
greater good of. the single unit. This
I accomplished at the sanitarium. It
was simply a question of will power.

The stupid doctors imagined my head-
aches were organic in nature, but they
were actually the result of intense,
feverish concentration over a period
of three months.”

“How could you create a physical
manifestation of your secondary nature
by will power alone?”

“It was not easy,” Colegrave replied.
“Since I am Colegrave, the respected
citizen, with the advantages of an ex-
cellent education, I am able to under-
stand the process. You are my sec-
ondary nature, primitive, ruthless, and
do not possess my intelligence.

“For that reason I doubt if you can
understand what happened in the
innermost depths of my psyche to
cause the physical split in my schizo-
phrenic condition.

“Suffice to say, I completely alienated
the two halves of my natures, by blot-
ting out all thought or awareness of my
second half. This was where the will
power was necessary. I concentrated,
at white-hot heat for three months, on
the one idea that my second nature was
non-existent. Thus I eventually forced
you from my conscious mind, into my
subconscious. Then I administered the
drug which I procured from the Vien-
nese brain specialist before entering the
sanitarium. It created a physical ex-
tension of my subconscious, which had
to have another outlet since it was
denied existence in my conscious mind
by the power of my will*.”

♦Anyone who has read Freud will understand
the manner by which Colegrave built up the ter-
rific, though artificial frustration in his mind.
Since he was a schizophrenic, with two separate
personalities, he created a tremendous repression
in his subconscious by willing one out of exist-
ence.

A physical example of what Colegrave did
would be in the case of a man who, with an
extreme -effort of will, denied himself even the
thought of food or drink. In that case, if this
were carried to its conclusion, the man would
certainly die. Colegrave “killed” his secondary

nature by denying its existence absolutely.

This “death” was in the form of a mighty
repression which built up pressure day by day,
just as a hot water boiler might. Then when the
ultimate repression was reached something had to
give. In Colgrave’s case, by the aid of strange
drugs, a physical manifestation of his subconscious
was created. The drugs might possibly be those
of Indian origin which are responsible for schizoid
transformation in small animals. It was from
a base of this type that the fictional transforma-
tion of Dr. Jekyl and Mr. Hyde was supposed
to have been effected. — E d.

124

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

“Well,” Colegrave’s subconscious
manifestation shrugged eloquently, “if
you say so, it’s okay with me. All I
want to know is where do we go from
here.”

Colegrave smiled again.

“That is really the important ques-
tion, isn’t it? When you materialized
I gave you certain instructions. Have
you carried them out?”

“Yep,” the little man nodded. “I’ve
got a place rented, and I’ve found the
town you wanted me to look up. It’s
a big place in the Middle West. The
situation there is perfect.”

Colegrave lighted a cigarette and in-
haled luxuriously.

“Fine. All my life I regarded
schizophrenia as a curse, but now I will
show the world a practical use for it.
A very practical use.”

He glanced out of the window at the
buildings and houses which were in-
creasing in frequency as they neared
the metropolitan area. A smile hovered
over his lips. A gloating, anticipatory
smile. . . .

A WEEK, later Colegrave, immacu-
v lately attired in a conservative gray
suit, approached the receptionist in an
office labeled simply: Ruzzoni Enter-
prises.

“My name is Colegrave,” he said
to the receptionist’s inquiring glance.
“I should like to see Mr. Ruzzoni.”
“Do you have an appointment?”
Colegrave smiled frostily.

“No. But I think he’ll see me. Tell
him it’s regarding the indictment the
district attorney and mayor of your
delightful town are bringing against
him.”

The receptionist' scrambled to her
feet and, with one puzzled glance at
Colegrave’s imperturbable figure, dis-
appeared through a heavy oak door.
She returned several minutes later.

“Mr. Ruzzoni will see you,” she mur-
mured. “Go right in.”

“Thank you,” Colegrave smiled.
Then he sauntered through the oak door
which had been left ajar, into a sumptu-
ously furnished office. In the center
of the room was a magnificent ma-
hogany desk, fully eight feet long, and
behind it hunched a fat, dark-skinned
man with an unlighted cigar jammed
into his face.

“Mr. Ruzzoni, I presume,” Cole-
grave said sarcastically.

“It ain’t nobody else,” the man be-
hind the desk snapped.

His wicked black eyes glittered bale-
fully and his hands balled into strain-
ing fists. Colegrave knew at a glance
that the man was laboring under a
terrific nervous tension.

“Well, whadda you want?” Ruzzoni
rasped. “Are you from the D. A.’s
office?”

Colegrave closed the door carefully
behind him. Then he seated himself
before the imposing desk, crossed his
legs and lighted a cigarette.

“I am not from the district attorney’s
office,” he said calmly. “I represent
no one but myself. And I think I might
be able to help you.”

Ruzzoni rose to his feet, his face
flushing dangerously.

“What kind of a gag is this?” he de-
manded harshly. “If you think you — ”

Colegrave raised one slim hand pro-
testingly.

“You are in trouble, are you not?”
he asked quietly. “I think you are
very stupid not to investigate any
means which might help you.”

“I don’t believe in boy scouts,”
Ruzzoni sneered. “Nobody’s goin’ to
help me!”

“Maybe,” Colegrave said, blowing a
cloud of smoke toward the ceiling, “and
maybe not. I am not a boy scout. What
I can do for you will be very expensive.

DOUBLE IN DEATH

125

And nothing is too hot for me.”
Ruzzoni settled back in his chair, a
puzzled frown on his swarthy features.

“I’m listening,” he said perkily. “But
I ain’t talking, see? I ain’t dumb
enough to fall into that kind of a trap.”

“TN THE first place,” Colegrave said
cheerfully. “As things stand you
are slated for a long trip to prison, and
possibly a detour to the chair if things
turn up which shouldn’t turn up.”
Ruzzoni swallowed painfully and a
band of beaded perspiration circled his
brow.

“The district attorney and the
mayor,” Colegrave went on, “are after
you, Ruzzoni, and they’ve got the goods
on you. You’ve been running the or-
ganized graft and gambling in this town
for eight years, and they figure that’s
about long enough. If they get an in-
dictment against you, you’re heading
for the chair. When one witness spills
his story, it’ll start them all talking.

“The only possible out for you is to
eliminate the mayor and the district
attorney in such a way that no sus-
picion falls on you. Then, in the chaos
that will result, you can move some
men you control on the judicial benches
into the offices of the mayor and district
attorney. It will be a simple matter
then to squash the indictment. Don’t
you agree that it’s a sensible plan?”
“It’s lovely,” Ruzzoni snapped bit-
terly. “But who’s goin’ to commit
suicide by trying to rub out the mayor
and D. A.? Even if he did get ’em, he
wouldn’t have a chance to get away.
I’ve offered my own boys as high as
fifty grand, but they won’t touch it.
The bunch of yellow rats!”

“I’ll handle that end of things,”
Colegrave said softly. “But it’s going
to cost you exactly one million dollars.”
“You’re crazy,” Ruzzoni cried.
“There ain’t that much money in this

whole town!”

Colegrave stood up.

“I’m not here to haggle,” he said
coldly. “A million — in cash. I’ll col-
lect after I do the job.”

“After you do the job?” Ruzzoni
said craftily. “Well that’s a little dif-
ferent. I think we can make a deal.”
“Don’t bank on my not being here
to collect it,” Colegrave said mirthless-
ly. “I have a habit of keeping dates. I’ll
meet you here the day after his honor
and the district attorney keep their
date with the gentleman with the scythe.
Is that agreeable with you?”

Ruzzoni licked his lips.

“Yeah, it’s okay by me.”

“Fine,” Colegrave said smoothly.
“I’ve drawn up something in the
nature of a contract for you to sign.
Just a little precaution in case you
forget our little deal after I do the job.
I wouldn’t like you to be troubled with
amnesia when I come around to collect.
An incriminating paper in my posses-
sion would prevent anything like that.”
“I ain’t signing nothin’,” Ruzzoni
snarled. “How do I know you’re on
the level?”

“You don’t,” Colegrave said quietly.
“It’s a chance you’re going to take. Of
course, if you prefer not to take that
chance — ”

He shrugged his shoulders and
started for the door.

“Wait!” Ruzzoni cried. “I — I’ll

string along.”

Colegrave smiled and pulled a paper
from his breast pocket.

“Just sign this, please. .

npHREE days later Theodore Cole-
grave paused before the imposing
edifice of the city hall, glanced casu-
ally up and down the street, before
turning to the small, grim looking man
who was with him.

“Quite sure of things, aren’t you?”

126

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

he asked quietly.

The little man — the physical mani-
festation of Colegrave’s duality —
nodded.

“The mayor and the district attorney
are together now examining wit-
nessess for the Ruzzoni hearing. I get
into the office with my fake message
and plug ’em both. Then I either get
shot or captured on the spot. Right?”

“Right,” Colegrave said. “And be
sure and not miss. There’s a million
dollars hanging on the accuracy of your
shots.”

“I won’t miss,” Colegrave’s second-
ary nature promised. “This is the kind
of thing I enjoy doing.”

“Then get going, Colegrave. And
good luck.”

“Thanks.”

Colegrave turned and, without a
backward glance, strolled off down the
Street. A block from the city hall he
increased his pace until he had covered
a half mile. Then he turned into a
restaurant and ordered a glass of wine.

“And bring me the next edition of
the afternoon paper,” he told the waiter
who took his order.

As he sipped his wine he went over
his scheme step by step and could find
no flaws. It was a masterful plan, he
was forced to admit. His secondary
self would commit the assassination
and receive the penalty. Thus he, Cole-
grave, would be rid of his schizophrenic
double, and, at the same time, he would
be earning a million cool dollars from
the vice lord, Ruzzoni. And that would
be only the start. With a million dol-
lars in his power, and forever rid of
his dual nature, there were no heights
to which he might not aspire.

He had no compunction about the
fact that his subconscious double would
be eliminated forever. Just as his sec-
ondary nature had no qualms about
sacrificing his physical life.

It was the really choice part of his
plan. The two natures acting in-
dependently to advance the single unit.
No possible suspicion could ever fall
on him for his part in the crime. The
double murder would be attributed to
a crazed madman, and after the assas-
sin was killed, the affair would be for-
gotten.

Colegrave drank his wine with
relish and ordered another glass. He
was a brilliant man, there was no
doubt of that.

Forty five minutes later the waiter
came rushing to his table with a copy
of a paper on which the ink was still
damp.

“Will yuh look at that?” he cried,
spreading the paper on Colegrave’s
table. The headline read:

MAYOR AND D.A. KILLED
BY ASSASSIN’S BULLETS.

KILLER CAPTURED WITH-
OUT STRUGGLE

“Terrible, isn’t it?” Colegrave mur-
mured.

Then he finished his drink, picked up
his change and sauntered out of the res-
taurant.

npHE next morning Ruzzoni paid off.

If there was any thought of a
double-cross in his mind, it was dis-
pelled when Colegrave informed him
that the incriminating contract was
locked in a safety deposit vault, with
instructions to disclose the contents if
he should meet with any violent acci-
dent.

“I’m paying off,” he said grinning.
“It’s worth it to me, in the first place,
and I can’t get out of it in the second
place. With the mayor and the D.A.
out of the way, that indictment is a
thing of the past. I’m in the clear and
in the saddle from now on in.”

DOUBLE IN DEATH

127

“One thing you can do for me,”
Colegrave said as he was leaving. “Ar-
range it for me to see this fellow that
did the job for me.”

“I’ve been wondering about him,”
Ruzzoni said softly, “What’s to pre-
vent him from singing? He must’ve
been an awful chump to take the
chance he did, but still he might be
bright enough to start poping off what
he knows.”

“That’s just it,” Colegrave smiled.
“He doesn’t know anything at all. Even
if he did I doubt if he’d talk.”

“It’s your neck if he does,” Ruzzoni
said. “I’ll arrange for you to see him.
They’ll rush through his trial, but I’ll
get you an interview with him the day
of the frying party. It shouldn’t
be more than a few weeks off.”

f\NE month later Colegrave was ad-
mitted into a barred, heavily-
guarded room, in which a small, surly
looking man sat hunched on a stool.
The head of the man was shaved and
his trouser legs were split. When he
saw Colegrave his ugly yellow teeth
showed in a grin.

“Everything’s jake, isn’t it?” he
asked.

“Be careful of what you say,” Cole-
grave murmured. “Yes, everything’s
jake. The last act takes place tonight
when the part of me that is you dies.
It is strange that I must die to live,
but that is the fact.”

Little more was said. When Cole-
grave left some minutes later, he felt
he was leaving a part of himself. But
this thought only elated him. It was
part of himself that he could well do
without, now that its usefulness was
over. It was like a man with a with-
ered arm having it amputated. With
the death of his subconscious manifes-
tation, he would be free forever to live
his own life, with the position and power

that his money would assure him.

At twelve o’clock that night Cole-
grave was seated in a smart night club,
formally attired in evening clothes, a
magnum of the finest quality cham-
pagne set before him.

Sweet strains of music floated
through the smoke-laden air, and the
dulcet laughter of pretty girls caressed
his ears.

This was the life that would be his
to enjoy completely in just exactly — he
glanced at his watch — two more min-
utes.

The execution was scheduled for
12:03.

He poured himself a drink of the
sparkling wine and lighted a cigarette.
In a minute and a half he would be
released forever from all worries. He
watched the second hand of his wrist
watch complete one circle and start
on the next. Just a matter of seconds
now ...

As the second hand started on the
last quarter of the minute, Colegrave
rose to his feet, glass in hand. It was
only fitting that he drink a toast to
the exit of his secondary nature.

He was raising his glass as the second
hand swept past 12:03.

“A toast to one who — ”

They were his last words.

A bolt of white-hot pain seemed to
crash into his brain, even as the words
echoed in his ears.* The glass in his
hand splintered as his hand closed
spasmodically, and the wine splashed
over his shirt front.

Then he crashed to the floor.

* What Colegrave, for all his cleverness, didn’t
realize, was that his own subconscious mind
would be shattered in the electric chair. When he
accomplished the physical cleavage between his
dual personality, his own subconscious intellect
activated the body of his secondary nature. Thus
when the electric current shot through the body
of the mayor and the district attorney’s assassin,
it was the mind of Colegrave that was destroyed
by the bolt. — E d.

128

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

A woman screamed, and the music
jerked to a ragged stop. A crowd clus-
tered about Colegrave’s lifeless figure,
until the manager arrived and had the
body carried to his office.

Then the police were called.

The coroner called it a heart attack,
although he said it should more ac-
curately be called a mind attack. The
tissues of the brain were seared and
shattered into shapeless shreds.

From the standpoint of the police
there was one very fortunate angle to

the mysterious death. For, when a cer-
tain safety deposit box corporation
learned of it, they handed to the guar-
dians of the law a document which con-
victed beyond all doubt a certain Mr.
Ruzzoni as being behind the double
killing of the mayor and the district
attorney.

Ruzzoni, however, saved the state
a job by committing suicide while the
police were smashing in the door of
his apartment.

THE END

IMAGINE PAIN IN AN AMPUTATED LEG

C'OR many years now, medicos have been
A puzzled by the peculiar phenomenon common
to those who have had a leg or an arm ampu-
tated. Many of these surgical cases occasionally
claim to “feel" pain in the missing limb. More
recently, however, a French physician, Dr. R.
Molinery (not heard from since Vichy), after
much research, believes that dreams, in the sub-

conscious mind, keep alive the picture of the
complete body.

It is explained that the subconscious, in con-
structing its dream memories of a complete body,
makes what seems like a pain or other sensation,
occasionally received over the cut fibers, to ap-
pear to come from a part of the body that is
really a figment of the imagination.

THE TEST OF DUST!

From which man after man failed to return. . . .
A Jealous governor ... a brilliant scientist who
knew men could retreat backward to simpler
forms of life ... his daughter, for whose match-
less charms man after man hfcd attempted the Test
of Dust, only to disappear . . . these form the
background of MADEMOISELLE BUTTERFLY by
Don Wilcox. . . . Louis Ribot knew the danger.
... He had seen the silver and blue clad suitor
on the scientist's Island, knew the man had dis-
appeared . . . and he saw the sliver and blue
synthetic butterfly dry Its wings and fly. . . . But
Mademoiselle Butterfly was beautiful. Rlbot was
in love. . . . The Test of Dust was before him.
. . . Read MADEMOISELLE BUTTERFLY, one
of the six great stories featured In the big

MAY ISSUE

ROMANCE OF THE ELEMENTS— HYDROGEN

It was some z. 50 f ears

AFTER PARACELSUS OBTAINED HWO-
GBJ THAT CAVENDISH EXPLAINED E15

fWTERHES; bow gotitthesnae
WM-BVTEEK 11N& MSALSWnH MW-
02AL ACIDS. jTl£r ICO YEARS AGO
CAVENDISH PROVED WHAT EVERY
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L3LN00O6EN ANDCW6EH. . .

Manv MODERN SCIENTISTS gm

AST THRONGS JAMMED we

CHAMP PE MAKS, PMS ( IN AUGUST, 1783,
TOWSWTHEWORLW FIKTHVDBD-
GEN-FIUED BALLOON ASCEND, fa
■ BOSE gOOO FEET, DRIFTED SMILES
Wa TDecm®, ALARMED H®CH
P0SANB AWHMTWimPncRfORkS
THINK] NO, IT SOME SKALKE BEAST/

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H YDROGEN Is number I in the International Table of Atomic Weights. Its symbol is H and
its atomic weight it 1.008. It is a gas, colorless, tasteless, odorless. Its specific gravity
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to a white solid at — 259°. It is used for inflating balloons, converting oils into solid fats,
synthesis of ammonia, and as fuel. Combines with chlorine, bromine, etc., as chlorides, bromides,
elc.

NEXT MONTH — The Romance of Iodine

129

130

by JAMES NORMAN

It took all the other-world science of Oscar, the
Martian detective to combat the dastardly Jap plot
that lay behind these innocent totem poles in Alaska

I WAS uneasy and worried as X
stood in the passenger lounge of
the Alaska-bound S. 5. Vancouver.
For an instant my eyes swept through
the port windows, across the wallow-
ing ship’s deck to the old slaty swells
of the Bering Sea. Off in the dis-
tance rose the foreboding rocks
of Cape Romanof and beyond

that, in the unseen immensity of the
frigid North — Nome.

I sighed anxiously, realizing my prob-
lem was one which might never bother
an Earthman as long as he remains tied
to his own planet. You see, I am from
another world. I am an alien creature,
not even a human. You’ve probably
read about it in the papers. It caused

131

132

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

quite a fuss in Washington, D. C., and
it still has the best minds in the State
Department in an awful dither. . . .
I, Oscar the Detective of Mars, am be-
ing deported 1

You may wonder why? If you read
the papers, you’ll recall how the press
eulogized me. Mass demonstrations
were staged in cities from New York
to Seattle in my favor, for the American
people really loved me and were pre-
pared to defend me in my moment of
peril.

Newspapers ran full length color pic-
tures of my penguin-shaped, four foot,
five inch body. They described what
a dapper little Martian I was. They
made a great play over my salmon pink
skin, my conical ears, my pertly flared
tulip nose and my feather clothing —
black tails, white vest and front which
I can take off like an evening suit. They
reviewed my exploits as a detective:
the Zombie case; the Indian Amnesia
case; always giving my tulip nose full
credit.

But now my deportation — how did it
happen? Well, though I sometimes
think of Mars in a nostalgic way, I like
Earth and America. So I applied for
U. S. citizenship. It was at this point
the belated discovery was made by im-
migration authorities that I had entered
the country illegally. You may remem-
ber how I appeared on this planet.
Hodar the Magician, during one of his
shows in Manhattan, prepared to pull
a chorus girl from a hat on the stage
but instead, I came out.

Well, nobody seemed to mind it ex-
cept the State Department; for it was
discovered that there is no quota of
immigration for Martians. Technically
I was subject to deportation. Even
Congress was sorry for this oversight
but the law was the law in spite of the
fact that many important figures
stepped forward to vouch for me. Even

Orson Welles put in a word, though I
am a little suspicious of Orson.

Since I couldn’t be deported back
into a hat, a mere stage prop, I was in-
structed to go to Alaska and make a
regular application for re-entry into the
States. Hodar, whom I hold partially
responsible for my being on Earth, now
accompanied me on my voyage into
exile. His loyalty, however, didn’t re-
lieve me of my worries; for up to this
very moment I had heard nothing from
the State Department. Little did I
know that my personal troubles would
soon bp overshadowed by a greater dan-
ger which would drastically affect my
position as an exile and plunge me into
a most amazing series of adventures.

It began when something plucked at
my arm as I stood in the ship’s lounge.
I turned, facing Higgins, our cabin
steward. Instantly my sensitive tulip
nose which probes into human gland-
ular odors and reads them as if they
were voices, told me that something
was wrong.

J.JIGGINS’ adrenals, the fear glands,
were overworking. That was very
evident in the way he snatched at my
sleeve and peered at me with oddly
bloodshot eyes. “Pardon me, sir,” he
spoke anxiously. “I read about you.
You’re really Oscar the Detective?”
“That’s me,” I replied.

“You solve cases by chemistry? You
know about gases, maybe?”

“My Martian brain," I answered,
preening myself modestly, “is a mecha-
nism capable of reducing all nature to
simple chemical formulae. What is it?”
The man hesitated, his eyes shifting
about worriedly. Then he whispered:
“I’ve run into something queer down
in the D hold. Would you come down
and look?”

“Now?”

“No. In fifteen minutes. I’ll be

OSCAR AND THE TALKIN® TOTEMS

133

waiting there for you.” Higgins’ eyes
abruptly flooded with combined fear
and suspicion when he saw Captain
Foflett enter the lounge. He muttered
something under his breath about gases
and hurried away.

Right then and there I had what you
Americans call a hunch. I knew a case
was brewing — the kind I shine in. It
wasn’t what Higgins told me, but what
his glands said, that put me on the alert.
I tried to catch Hodar’s attention.

Hodar was at the far end of the
lounge, giving an impromptu show for
the passengers who now sat open-
mouthed, watching his wrist flick and
turn an ordinary table cloth into a bril-
liant fluttering Union Jack. He was
tall and well poised and his engaging
personality was always at its best be-
fore an audience.

“Now,” he said, flinging his black
cloak over his arm to indicate the per-
formance was almost ended, “Are there
any special tricks or illusions the ladies
and gentlemen wish to see? Only one.
Which is it? The Indian rope trick?
Cards?”

He glanced at the first row of chairs,
his eyes twinkling from Karl Bowen,
the eminent arctic explorer and scien-
tist, to Jane Lee, a pretty, blonde Amer-
ican girl on her way to Alaska to be
married. “How about it, Miss Lee?”
Hodar smiled.

The girl shook her head and blushed.
“Ask Mr. Quest,” she suggested.

Hodar glanced at the rather quiet,
mild-mannered young man on her left.

“How about producing Hitler so we
can dunk him in the sea?” the young
man asked.

“Ah,* Ah,” said Hodar. “That’s
Churchill’s job, not ours. He’ll prob-
ably get dunked anyway.”

Bowen, the explorer, looked up.
“You’re a magician,” he said. “Why
not produce the aurora borealis /”

“The Northern Lights,” laughed
Hodar. “Well, I don’t know. Perhaps
they’re out of season. Furthermore, I
doubt if I could produce them on the
scale you're accustomed to. I’m just
an ordinary magician. Now, if I were
a god, I’d say ‘presto, Northern Lights.’
I’d wave my wand like this and. . . .”

Hodar’s voice faltered. His hand
froze in midair and he stared in fas-
cinated amazement toward the north-
ern windows of the lounge.

“Good God — he’s done it!” someone
shouted.

A dozen people came to their feet
and their expressions ranged from out-
right shock to incredulous wonder. A
buxom lady took one look at the win-
dows and fell over in a dead faint,
crushing a chair in the process. Then
came an instant of frigid silence. Karl
Bowen’s voice broke through it with
naked force.

“The borealisf" he gasped. “It’s

impossible!”

T) EYONI) the lounge windows the sky
flooded with strange eldritch lights.
They flared up suddenly, an eerie, tor-
tuous glow bathing the dull sea and
heaven in a way that made the blood in
one’s veins run cold. Then they van-
ished almost as quickly and abruptly
as they had come.

Hodar was the first to recover his
self control. “Lord Almighty,” he
whispered in a strained voice. "I didn’t
do that. I couldn’t have. I’m no
magician; I’m a showman.”

“Those were the lights,” said Cap-
tain Follett.

“Pretty slick trick, I’d say!” It was
Meung, a French-Canadian passenger
speaking. He glared at Hodar coldly,
almost malevolently. He was a thin,
hook-nosed professional gambler with a
spiked black moustache. He disliked
Hodar intensely for the latter had

134

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

showed him a thing or two with cards
on our first day out.

“Listen,” Hodar said angrily, “If
I—”

His threat was never finished for an
ominous booming sound swelled in the
distance. It shook the very sky and
sea with its tremendous concussion.
The ship’s fixtures rattled and danced
like mad. I could sense the fear that
leaped into the passengers as they
stared at each other and reached fran-
tically for support while the ship tossed
as though caught in the iron grip of
some unseen tidal force.

“We’re being torpedoed!” someone
screamed.

People rushed out on deck. Some
grabbed up life preservers; others
fought for a place near the boats. Cap-
tain Follett’s voice cut through the
confusion and, after a few tense sec-
onds, calmed the passengers by its
sheer force. “I want order! ” he roared.
“We’re not being torpedoed. We don’t
know what’s happened. Just stand
by!”

A junior officer raced down the bridge
ladder to the Captain’s side. His face
was white and tensed. “Tidal wave,*
Sir,” he reported. “That’s all we can
make out. Seems to have been a vol-
canic explosion in the sea, some dis-
tance ahead. Mr. Clark wants to know
if we should change course?”

“Blasted no!” said the Captain.
“We’ll investigate.”

Karl Bowen came up. “Those lights
we saw weren’t Northern Lights,” he
said quickly. “I tell you, there’s some-
thing wrong. The aurora borealis are
never accompanied by sound or tidal
reactions.”

“How long a time passed between the
lights and the sound?” I cut in.

“A little more than three minutes,”
said Bowen.

Hodar and the Captain nodded in

agreement.

“Okay,” I said. “Computing the
relative speed of sound and light plus
the interval of difference between them,
I’d say the source of those lights and
the explosions is about forty-four miles
or so. Sound travels about one mile in
five seconds. Where would that be,
Captain Follett?”

“It could be anywhere. The main-
land or, directly ahead, St. Lawrence
Island.”

“But it can’t be,” Bowen protested.
“There are no volcanic formations in
the island. And the few volcanoes on
the mainland within that distance are
all extinct.”

A commotion on deck interrupted us.
My eyes swept toward the companion-
way ladder to witness a startling scene.

Higgins, the cabin steward, lurched
out upon deck drunkenly. His face was
beet-red as he stumbled forward. He
was laughing in a high-pitched, un-
controllable manner that sent a queer
chill running up my spine.

“Higgins!” snapped Follett.

“G-G-Hold . . . gas ha . . . ha . .

I stared at the man for laughter,
when it is uncontrolled and hysterical,
when it has a thread of madness cours-
ing through it, becomes an unnerving
sound. The steward’s voice scaled to
a screeching pitch as he staggered
toward us. “Gasss . . . ha . . . ha . . .”
His voice suddenly shattered upon a
high note. He stiffened abruptly, then
collapsed on the deck.

It was then that my sensitive nose
caught another mystifying odor — but
I’ll explain this later.

CHAPTER II
Murder

J ANE LEE stepped through the door-
way of my cabin and glanced sym-

OSCAR AND THE TALKING TOTEMS

135

pathetically toward the bed where we
had placed the unconscious steward.
“Can I help at all?” she asked. “I’m a
trained nurse. At least I was.”

I smiled and my ductless glands let
out a polite and appreciative little
secretion — a reaction I simply can’t
curb when I see a pretty Earth girl.
"Please,” I said, “You might look after
Higgins until the doctor comes.”
Captain Follett had been standing
by, fuming. “What’s wrong with
Higgins?” he demanded. “Never seen
the man act like that. Good solid man,
Higgins.”

“I’ve got my suspicions— chem-
icals!” I murmured.

Then to everyone’s puzzlement, I
busied myself at the cabin washbasin
where I soaked two towels in water and
wrung them half dry, then sprinkled
a little brandy on each. I gave one to
Hodar, the other to Follett. “Wrap
these around your face, covering your
mouth and nose. Breathe through
them,” I explained. “We’re visiting
the D hold.”

At the bottom of the D hold I flashed
my pocket torch around, letting the
beam slice through the stygian darkness
and stuffiness. The place was filled
with drums and heavy tins. They
creaked and scraped with the motion of
the ship. Walking along the narrow
passageway, I clucked appreciatively,
reading the labels painted on the cargo.
“Nitric acid. Sulphuric acid. Eh!”
Then I saw what I was looking for —
a few tins of ammonium nitrate which
had fallen across a high pressure steam
pipe that ran through the hold. My
sensitive nose fluttered like humming
bird wings. To my right I heard Hodar
and the Captain begin giggling.

Instantly, I knew what was wrong in
the hold — nitrous oxide! The tins of
ammonium nitrate had spilled upon the
intensely hot steam pipes. An oxida-

tion had occurred. The result was sim-
ple laughing gas!

“Get back on deck, quick!” I
shouted at Hodar. An overdose could
seriously affect their nervous systems
as it had done to poor Higgins.

As for myself, I remained. Laugh-
ing gas doesn’t affect me as it does
Earthmen. I didn’t giggle and get
high. Instead, my glands let out an al-
most uncontrollable series of sweet
smelling sympathetic odors — chuckles,
to be exact. You see, until my appear-
ance on Earth, I had never used
sounds for speech. Martians use odors.
Having perfect control of every gland
in our penguin-shaped bodies, we con-
vey thoughts by odor frequencies. But
you have to have a nose and a body
like mine for this.

I whipped out a pencil and pad and
began scribbling in Martian swift hand,
a much faster, scientifically designed
method of speedwriting than your
various shorthands. What did I write
down there in the hold? You’d be sur-
prised. The nitrous oxide was saying
things to me — comic gags. I wrote
them down with the intention of send-
ing them to my good friend, Bob Hope.

I also made myself a memo suggest-
ing the compilation of a lexicon of
odors and a key to it so that profes-
sional humorists and gagmen in the
future might explore the rich storehouse
of humor — nitrous oxide.

T TPON deck, I found Hodar and Cap-
tain Follett recovered from their
experience in the cargo hold. Hodar
shot me a funny glance, saying, “What
the devil is it all about, Oscar? I feel
as much in the dark as a couple of diplo-
mats shooting with cold dice in a pitch
black room.”

“You tell me,” I said. “We’re on a
case but this time we’re in it before it’s
really started. I can’t actually tell

186

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

what’s in the air. Still, jnst the fact
that this ship is crammed with nitric
and sulphuric acids puts me in a queer
frame of mind.”

“The cargo?” asked Captain Follett.
“It’s for delivery to the Seward Import
Company. What’s so queer about
that?"

“Just one thing,” I Teplied. “I’ve
been reading up on Alaska. Chemicals
used in the mining industry there are
brought in in small amounts. Nothing
like this. Who wants these chemicals
and why? The Eskimos don’t eat
them.”

A bell rang on the ship’s bridge and
at the same instant there came a pierc-
ing scream from the direction of my
cabin. “It’s the girll ” I cried. “Come
on 1 ” I raced along the uneven deck,
banging once into an air-vent funnel
and cursing aloud with a none too pret-
ty string of Martian odor-oaths. I
knew that I shouldn’t have left Jane
Lee alone with the unconscious steward.

Bursting into the cabin, I saw her
crumpled upon the floor in a pitiful
sobbing heap. In one hand she clutched
a brandy glass, the contents of which
had spilled over the carpet. I breathed
a sigh of relief when we finally lifted
her to a chair and found her unhurt.

“What happened?” I asked as her
eyes fluttered open.

The girl’s stare was fraught with hor-
ror. Her cheeks were deathly pale and
her small warm lips trembled as she
glanced across the cabin to the bed.
My eyes followed hers, then I stiffened.
At the same moment, a violent gland-
ular odor assailed my flared nose. The
odor of death!

“Higgins!" said Hodar.

“Stone dead!” cut in Captain Follett.

I came to the bedside and took a look
at the man. There was a dark sticky
blotch on his forehead and the back of
his head had been ripped out. “Mur-

dered — ,” I said slowly. “Shot at close
range through the forehead. The gun
shot was muffled by this pillow wrapped
around the weapon.” I stooped and
picked up an empty shell from the floor.

“Here’s the gun,” cried Hodar. He
pointed at a Webley service automatic
which lay on its right side upon a small
table near the door. The gun hadn’t
been there when we brought Higgins
into the cabin.

“Don’t touch it, yet,” I ordered. I
turned to Jane Lee. She was still pale
and shaken but she stared at me clear
eyed. “So, what happened?” I asked
her.

Her lips quivered again. “It’s ter-
rible, horrible,” she said in a low, halt-
ing voice. “It’s my fault. I shouldn’t
have left him alone.”

“You left the cabin?" I asked, sur-
prised.

“Yes,” said Jane. “I felt the man
needed a stimulant so I ran to the bar
for some brandy. I was only gone a
minute. When I returned he was. . . .”

“Murdered!” put in Captain Follett.

“There was brandy right here in the
cabin,” I said pointing to a table near
the bed.

Jane Lee’s eyes widened when she
saw the brandy flask which Hodar and
I kept in our cabin as a sort of precau-
tion against the weather. “No. I didn’t
see it,” she cried. “Oh, I wish I had.”

(-'APTAIN FOLLETT crossed in
front of the girl and looked down
at her sternly. “What’s to prove the
brandy spilled on the carpet wasn’t
from this flask?” he asked. “Miss Lee,
can anyone prove you went to the bar?
The bartender?”

A look of new terror came into the
girl’s blue eyes. “Anyone see me?” she
whispered. “No. Why no I The bar-
tender wasn’t there. I just took the
brandy. I had to hurry.”

OSCAR AND THE TALKING TOTEMS

137

Captain Follett grunted doubtfully
and swerved his attention to where I
was breaking open the dip of the mur-
der gun and counting the bullets. I
nodded toward him.

“This is it, Captain,” I said. “One
shell gone.”

Suddenly I raised the murder weapon
to my nose, taking a long careful sniff
as people do just before they’re about
to sneeze. But I didn’t sneeze. I was
detecting.

“Needn’t bother about fingerprints,”
I said. “This gun was held by a gloved
hand when it was fired. Leather odor
on it. Pigskin to be exact.”

I handed the gun to Captain Follett.

“Okay, Captain,” I said. “Please
hold this gun as if you were going to
shoot it, then put it on the table exactly
as we found it. Remember, exactly I”

“What?” The Captain looked mysti-
fied.

“Just a little curiosity of mine,” I
murmured.

Captain Follett agreed. -He twirled
the gun in his right hand, aimed it for
an instant, glanced at me in puzzlement
and set the weapon upon the table on its
leftside. I had Hodar repeat the per-
formance. Finally I handed the gun to
Jane Lee. I watched closely as she
took the gun in her right hand, held it
gingerly for a second before setting it
down in exactly the same position as
Captain Follett and Hodar had done.

“What’s this nonsense about,” Fol-
lett demanded. “Give me that gun.
I’ll have it traced.”

“Don’t bother,” I said. “My nose
has already informed me of the owner.”

“You know?” Follett and the girl
looked at me amazed.

“Sure l know — Karl Bowen, the ex-
plorer!” I said. “Hodar, you and I are
going to pay Bowen a visit. And Cap-
tain, I’d rather you didn’t come. I’ll
report to you later.”

TN THE B deck passageway I raised

my hand to rap on a stateroom door
when Hodar called my attention to the
nameplate, “Meung.” For the hun-
dredth time I rued the fact that every-
thing on Earth, including stateroom
door nameplates and ships bars, are de-
signed for six foot earth men and not
four foot Martians.

“Pardon my inches,” I murmured
when Meung the Gambler opened the
door and glared at me. I promptly re-
moved myself another door down the
passage and knocked.

The door, this time, was opened by
Bowen himself. He was a medium
height man. He looked older than his
fifty years, his friendly face worn by
the hardship of years spent in the
Arctic.

“How’s the cabin steward? Recov-
ered?” he asked as Hodar and I en-
tered.

“In a way,” I murmured. Then, as
the door was shut, I quickly explained
that murder had been committed aboard
ship. Bowen listened without saying
a word until I came to the unpleasant
business — the gun.

“My gun!” he gasped. “But I have
my gun. I saw it in my case only an
hour or two ago. And I’ve been in my
stateroom ever since I left you with
Higgins. He was alive then.”

“Well, Bowen,” I said. “I was
pretty sure you didn’t fire that gun.
But who came in here and stole your
gun?”

“Nobody,” replied the explorer. He
hastily threw his traveling bag upon
the bed, unlatched it and rummaged
among some clothing. Finally he pulled
out a Webley service automatic.

“Great guns! Twins!” Hodar mur-
mured.

I took the Webley, slipped out the
cartridge clip and found it full. “Are
you sure this is yours?”! demanded.

138

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

Bowen looked perplexed. “Well . . .
that’s strange,” he said. “My gun
wasn’t loaded.”

“Naturally, because it isn’t yours,” I
said. “To make sure we can check on
the serial numbers. This automatic
was planted here recently,” — Again I
sniffed at the gun but this time I jerked
my nose away as if it had been stung.
For a moment I gasped and snorted
violently. “Gasoline! . . . The gun’s
been dipped in gasoline to destroy all
personal identifying odors. Very clever
indeed!”

“What?” Hodar cut in.

“Just what I said,” I repeated.
“We’re working against an amazingly
clever criminal. A man who took my
detecting ability into account when he
planned his crime. He planted this
odor-free gun here so Karl Bowen
wouldn’t be alarmed upon discovering
his own Webley automatic missing.
After the/crime, the murderer probably
intended stealing his own gun back.
We weren’t expected to search Bowen
for his gun so quickly. But the mur-
derer make one mistake. I traced the
murder gun to Bowen by smell instead
of through police or manufacturer’s
records. That should have been dipped
in gasoline also. Then we wouldn’t
have questioned Bowen for some days
yet.”

“But why was the steward mur-
dered?” asked Hodar.

“Because I think he knew too much.
His death is but a symptom of a bigger
case. A case with chemicals in it. I’m
sure of this because I know who •shot
him!”

“You’ve discovered that already?
But how?”

I shook my head. “It won’t do to
reveal the murderer yet,” I said.
? There’s more than one man in this.
Our job is to be on the alert. Let’s get
back to our cabin.”

r T~'HE cabin had become quite
A crowded since our departure. When
we returned with Bowen, we found that
the Captain had gone while the ship’s
doctor and young Mr. Quest had come
in. It was Quest who surprised us.

He was no longer the young, unas-
suming young man who had followed
Jane Lee around like a puppy, despite
the fact that she was engaged to still
another in Nome. He had changed. He
looked hard and efficient. His chilly
gray eyes stabbed at us, each in turn.

“I’m Quest,” he said. “Lieutenant
James Quest of the CRMP.”

“The Canadian Mounteds,” said
Hodar in surprise.

Quest nodded. “I’m taking over,”
he said. “This is a Canadian ship. A
Canadian has been murdered.”

“That isn’t all — said a voice be-
hind Quest. It was Captain Follett.
Something strange had happened to
him. He leaned against the door and
looked at us queerly, like a man who
was punch-drunk. “The St. Lawrence
Island is gone— gone out of the sea,” he
said harshly.

There were running footsteps outside
on the deck, then voices, amazed shouts
and more footsteps. The name, St.
Lawrence, was repeated in a dozen in-
credible tones. Then a bell clanged up
on the bridge.

In the cabin, everyone stared at Cap-
tain Follett as though he were mad.
The St. Lawrence Island was the big-
gest stretch of land in the Bering Sea.

“Gone, you said!” Bowen finally
broke the silence. The explorer’s face
went absolutely dead white.

CHAPTER III

Meung

HpHE first of the winter storms had
A blown through Nome. It had blan-

OSCAR AND THE TALKING TOTEMS

139

keted Alaska from Fairbanks to Point
Spencer with a ceaseless driving snow
that extended even to the margins of
the Seward Peninsula where a frigid
tide rolled down direct from the frozen
tip of the planet.

Death rode in the sub-zero wind that
whined across the storied Nome beach.
There were no ships now. The last, the
S. S . Vancouver, was gone two days.
Nome was snowbound, but Nome was
also in a fervor of excitement.

The St. Lawrence Island had van-
ished completely. Nome’s Daily Clarion
blasted the news through the frozen
city. There hadn’t been a shred of
word from the few hundred natives and
the single trading post on the Bering
Sea island. Two coast guard cutters
had braved a stormy sea and came back
to report that there was nothing left
but a large wave-washed reef where the
island had once been.

“Well, catastrophe is putting it
mildly,” observed Hodar as he, Lieu-
tenant Quest and I sat in our hotel in
Nome. “But I don’t see where the
island has anything to do with the mur-
der case?”

“All right,” said Quest. “You and
Oscar have given me a bit of a hand as
far as Bowen is concerned. I’ll take
you in on this. There may be more
than just murder. Oscar ought to ap-
preciate the connection. He’s got an
imagination.”

“I hardly need imagination to know
the island is gone,” said Hodar. “We
passed right by where it wasn't”

Lieutenant Quest smiled. “But you
don’t know why I came aboard the ship
in Vancouver?”

“Meung?” I asked.

Quest darted a surprised look at me.
“How did you know?”

“Because you pretended not to know
him aboard ship,” I replied.

“Very well,” said Quest. “But this

business started with a secret meeting
of international diplomats in Lisbon,
Portugal. My government was inter-
ested in it for two reasons: Europe is
at war; secondly, certain representa-
tives of opposing nations came to-
gether in that meeting. Furthermore,
the greater number of representa-
tives came from nations which had
only one thing in common — Arctic
claims.

“Meung the gambler seemed to be a
Canadian representative. We think he
was acting for someone else. Now, we
don’t know what occurred at this meet-
ing. Meung returned to Canada,
crossed the country to Vancouver and
caught the boat to Alaska. I was as-
signed to check up on his movements
and contacts. Gambling is just his
front.”

“So you think Meung knows some-
thing about the lost island?” Hodar
asked. “That’s impossible. It takes
big money to remove land. Look what
the Panama Canal cost the U. S. Gov-
ernment. Think of the time and men it
took.”

I stood up suddenly, grabbing Hodar.
“That’s not our worry now,” I said. “I
think Meung needs a little investigat-
ing. While Quest keeps his eye on
Bowen, you and I are going to pay a
visit. And while I’m visiting, you’re
going to search Meung’s quarters.”

jP\OWNTOWN Nome was almost de-
^ serted when we went out. Foot-
paths had been cut around the snow-
drifts that choked the crooked main
street. Here and there we saw native
dogs huddled in doorways, their thick
fur billowing in the cutting wind. The
town was dotted, almost every corner,
with those grotesquely carved Alaskan
totem poles. '

One by one, as I passed them, I felt
my heavy Martian skin creep over my

140

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

bones. There was something about the
totems that filled me with a queer in-
expressible feeling — a sensation of dan-
ger. Suddenly, as I approached the
sixth pole along the street I stopped,
fascinated by the fantastic face carved
upon the totem.

“Hodar,” I said, “I’ll swear that
thing said something.”

“The totem?” Hodar looked at me
queerly. “Don’t let them get you down,
Oscar. They’re just put up for the sum-
mer tourist trade.”

I looked at the totem again. I was
positive the thing had been trying to
say something to me. Or was this the
imagination Lieutenant Quest had com-
mented on?

“Here’s Meung’s hangout. The
Malemute Bar,” said Hodar. “We part
here, eh?”

The Malemute Bar was the biggest
and toughest place in Nome. I real-
ized that the instant I walked in, and I
quickly forgot my worries about the
totem poles. The Malemute hung
heavy with smoke. Raucous voices and
laughter rang out along the busy bar.
To the right, miners and fishermen,
white and native, crowded around
roulette, faro and poker tables. A
drunk played mechanically at a tin pan
piano which was lined with whiskey
glasses.

I caused quite a sensation when I
pushed through the swinging doors and
stood there in what appeared to be an
evening suit. People don’t often see a
Martian with a tulip nose like mine. A
couple of men grabbed for their drinks.
Another man swore off the stuff for
life and stumbled out of the bar mum-
bling: “Pink elephants are bad

enough, but good god!”

I saw Meung at a poker table, his
back to the wall. He was startled, see-
ing me in the Malemute. I immediately
sauntered to the table and dropped

into a vacant place. “Deal me in,” I
said. “I feel lucky today. Let’s make
it worth while. Draw with table stakes.
Start with five hundred dollars.”

The other players at the table sort of
stiffened, glaring at me suspiciously.
“That let’s me out,” said one. The
other three players also folded up their
cards.

“So, it looks like you and me,” Me-
ung said. He greedily watched the
crisp green one hundred dollar bills I
paid out for my stack of chips.

Sensing something unusual, the men
and women in the cafe edged around
our table. I caught a bit of uneasy
murmuring, for tough as Nome’s citi-
zens were, they still liked fair play and
in their eyes I was just a queer little tin-
horn lined up against a sharp.

The tune changed swiftly as the play
began. The sourdoughs and breeds
soon opened their eyes in amazement.
From the start, I won. Slowly, the
chips piled up on my side. In fact, I
could hardly see over the top of them.

Meung didn’t have a chance. I
know poker too well. I’m a whizz at
it. My sensitive nose caught and trans-
lated Meung’s slightest nervous reac-
tion. I read right through his poker
face. My scientific comptometer-like
brain calculated odds down to a hair’s
breadth. This time the gambler was up
against it for still another reason — I
was cheating also!

'TTME after time I filled my hand
with a pair, then three queens.
How those queens came up fifteen times
in a row is my secret. Gradually, as
the chips drifted my way and as the
angry glint in Meung’s eyes turned to
malevolent suspicion, I prepared for a
climax.

The onlookers watched the table
tensely, wolfishly. Table stakes such
as these hadn’t been seen since the

OSCAR AND THE TALKING- TOTEMS

141

gOldrush days.

Meung watched me like a hawk as I
dealt my surprise hand. I nursed the
deck slowly; one card for Meung, one
card for me, one for Meung. With de-
liberate slowness I partially concealed
the deck with my right hand. There
was a slight flick of my left thumb, but
obvious enough for all to see. I dealt,
not the top card, but the second one.
For an instant I held it poised and
then dropped it, a queen, beside two
black queens.

There came a gasp from the wolves
around the table. Meung reared sud-
denly to his feet and like a striking
rattlesnake, his hand dipped under his
coat. People ducked under tables as
Meung’s revolver barrel flashed in the
lamplight. My eyes abruptly riveted
upon the gun. Meung’s thumb auto-
matically rubbed the pistol-waist to re-
lease a safety catch, but his gun had
no catch.

“Take it easy, partner,” I said.

“You cheating sideshow 1 I’ll blow
your blasted head off!” Meung snarled.

“Forget the gun,” I said. Casually,
I shoved all my chips, a good eight
thousand dollars toward the table cen-
ter. “I’ll stake these against that shoot-
ing iron of yours, Meung. I’m giving
you a chance. You deal.”

The gambler looked at me queerly.
“Are you bats?” he growled.

“Nope, just a born gambler. These
chips against your gun,” I smiled.

Slowly, almost hesitantly, Meung
placed his gun upon the table and slid
into his chair. His fingers reached for
the cards. Every eye in the room was
fastened upon our table. We were
watched with the intensity of arrested
motion.

Meung began the deal, watching me
suspiciously as I gathered up my cards.

“Maybe you don’t want to finish this
hand,” I suddenly spoke. “Maybe you

won’t want to finish when I tell you I
didn’t come to gamble, but just to make
sure you shot cabin steward Higgins
aboard the S.S. Vancouver!”

Meung bunched his cards under his
chin. For an instant he looked past
me. Without turning, I knew a girl
stood behind me, signaling what I held
in my hand to Meung. Then his eyes
settled on me. “Smart little guy, eh?”
he said sarcastically.

“Not smart,” I countered. “Just
watchful, like that gal behind me. I
knew you killed Higgins because you’re
left-handed. Naturally you set a gun
down on its right side. You did it with
Bowen’s gun. You just did it now with
this pistol.”

“Day dreaming, aren’t you!”
snapped Meung.

“You were in the stateroom next to
Bowen’s aboard ship so you were able
to get into his room. You borrowed his
gun for the murder and left your own
Webley so he wouldn’t think his own
was missing,” I said evenly. “You’re
not used to revolvers, Meung. Rather
have a Webley Automatic. I noticed
your thumb reaching for the safety on
this revolver. A Webley would have
had a safety catch.”

Meung sprang to his feet. His eyes
stabbed at me with murderous rage.
“You little rat!” he hissed.

His hand darted for the pistol upon
the table. It moved as swiftly and
surely as a rapier thrust — but not fast
enough. The gun wasn’t there.

With all my weight, I banged down
on my side of the round poker table.
Chips scattered in all directions and, as
the table slanted, Meung’s revolver slid
into my hands. The far table edge
shot upward clipping the gambler on
the point of his jaw. Meung keeled
over, cold.

“That, my good man,” I said as I
gathered up my chips from the floor,

142

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

“is a lesson. Don’t play with firearms.”

CHAPTER IV
Drums of Lead

T IEUTENANT QUEST paced the
floor in my room and slapped a
fist impatiently in the palm of one hand.
“This whole case is haywire,” he said.
“First you come back from the Male-
mute saying Meung killed the steward
and Bowen is innocent. Then Hodar
says he fine-combed Meung’s quarters
and found absolutely nothing. Now
look at the report I get from the tele-
phone central on Bowen.”

“You mean you had Bowen’s wire
tapped?” asked Hodar.

“Right. And he made a call this
morning. Who do you think he called?”

“Probably Jane Lee,” I said.

Lieutenant v Quest frowned. “He
called Meung!”

“What?”

“That’s right. And this is what he
said, word for word”: — Lieutenant
Quest read from a slip of paper — “ ‘You
stole my plans, my life’s work. If you
don’t stop, I’ll expose the entire busi-
ness’ But that’s as much information
as I’ve got,” said Quest. “Meung ar-
ranged to meet Bowen on the docks
behind the Seward Salmon Cannery at
four o’clock. That’s an hour from
now.”

“Well, don’t arrest them,” I cut in.
“Let them meet. We’ll be there.”

“It’s pretty odd of Bowen,” Hodar
murmured. “He’s not the type to mix
up with crooks.”

There was a knock at our door.
Opening the door, I was surprised to
see Jane Lee accompanied by a heavy
set young man who wore rimless
glasses. The man was what you call
the go-getter type.

“Oscar,” Jane began. “This is my

fiance, Jack — ”

The go-getter stepped into the room
briskly. “Let me do the talking, Jane,”
he said. “I’m Jack Williams, head of
the Williams North Star Trading Posts.
Got forty of them. All over the penin-
sula. You’re Oscar, eh? Sort of a
scientist?”

I gasped a little at the breathless
swiftness with which Jack Williams
spoke.

“Here,” said Williams, taking a
packet of greenbacks from his brief
case and plunking them on the table.
“Ten thousand dollars expense money.
I just lost an important trading post
on St. Lawrence Island. Can’t afford
to let it happen again. Got another
post at Nunivak Island South of here.
Your job is to head an expedition with
Karl Bowen. Find out why the St.
Lawrence sank. Find out if Nunivak
is safe.”

“What do you mean — my job?” I
answered. I disliked the idea of being
railroaded into anything by efficient
young business men.

“You’ve got to do it,” snapped Wil-
liams. “I’ll see that Nome’s Chamber
of Commerce adds another $50,000 to
this. The expedition ship is on its way
up from St. Michael. Be ready to-
morrow. Okay?”

Jack Williams snapped his brief case
shut, took Jane Lee’s arm and breezed
out of the room almost as quickly as
he had come. I noticed a sort of mel-
ancholy look in Lieutenant Quest’s eyes
as he watched the couple depart.

I glanced at my watch. It was quar-
ter of four.

I deposited Williams’ packet of
money along with my poker winnings
in the hotel safe downstairs as we left
for the salmon cannery. “Sixty thou-
sand dollars for a bit of detecting isn’t
bad at all,” I murmured. “That is, if
the Chamber of Commerce comes

OSCAR AND THE TALKING TOTEMS

across.”

Hodar looked at me as if I were mad.

“But Oscar, we’re already working
on a case with Quest,” he said.

“Don’t kid yourself,” I grinned.
“Maybe Williams and the Chamber of
Commerce don’t realize it. But our
two cases are connected. The only
trouble is, I don’t know what the devil
we’re facing. ... Or do I?”

TV/f Y voice sort of drifted off, frozen
1 A in the zero air. Again I was
staring at one of those confounded To-
tem poles. I could have sworn 1
smelled the thing talking. I stepped
toward the grotesque image when Ho-
dar suddenly grabbed me.

“Come on, Oscar, we’re late.”

“But the totem is talking,” I said.

“Nuts!”

It was bitter cold when we arrived
at the salmon cannery docks. The sky
was overcast and darkening. A steady,
saw-toothed wind whipped among the
buildings and out across the black
waters of the sea.

“We’ll stop here on the leeward side
of the building until Meung shows up,”
said Lieutenant Quest as he loosened
the gun in his holster.

Suddenly something hit me an awful
wallop, a short left jab to the nose. I
staggered back against Hodar, clutch-
ing at his coat tails for support. “Great
Martian Godsl” I cried, meanwhile
holding my sensitive nose.

Both Hodar and Quest stared at me
curiously, then Hodar began laughing.
“I forgot about that, Oscar. The
salmon smell. It must have hit a nose
like yours a terrific blow, eh?”

The fish odor from the cannery!
That was a new and horrible experi-
ence for me. And let me tell you, if
Earthmen ever want to conquer Mars,
the odor of a salmon cannery and not
guns will do it.

143

“It’s absolutely barbaric,” I told
Hodar. It was then that I got one of
my more commercial ideas. My nose
and brain took but a moment to an-
alyze the components of odor piscium,
better known as fish smell. I tore a
leaf from my notebook and scribbled
out a quick, workable formula for tak-
ing the smell out of canned fish. I
hurried around to the main entrance
of the building to slip the memo under
their door.

But that was as far as I got. I saw
the company’s name on the door —
SEWARD SALMON COMPANY,
SUBSIDIARY OF SEWARD IM-
PORT COMPANY.

Lieutenant Quest came around and
saw me goggling at the nameplate. “It’s
after four,” he growled. “Meung and
Bowen haven’t shown hide nor hair.”

“Is nitric acid used for canning?” I
asked abruptly.

Quest stared at me strangely.

“I think this cannery needs’ a going
over,” I added. “Hodar, pull your
magic out and open this door.”

Hodar, who is, if anything, better
than Houdini, sort of opened Lieu-
tenant Quest’s eyes when he opened
the sturdy double bolt door in less than
eleven seconds. “Good Lord,” mur-
mured the Lieutenant, “and here I used
a jimmy to break into Captain Follett’s
cabin when I searched it aboard ship.”

I found a light switch and flooded
the principal room of the cannery.
Most of the equipment had been oiled
and covered. This was the off season.
As we moved toward the back of the
building I saw something that struck
me oddly. . . .

Piled in one corner were dozens of
the huge metal drums which I had seen
in the hold of the S.S. Vancouver l Be-
yond them were some vats. I dipped
my finger in one, smelling and tasting
the liquid. It was a sweet, sirupy,

144

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

colorless stuff. The identifying formula
C,Hs(OH), — saponified natural fats — -
leaped to my mind instantly.

Near these vats were a number of
huge cylindrical drums made of lead
and partially encased by wood. They
looked like converters of some sort. X
began to investigate when Hodar, who
had drifted off to a small side office,
shouted at the top of his lungs. “OS-
CARI”

I scurried around the converters like
a rabbit with buckshot an inch behind
him. Hodar was kneeling over a man’s
body.

It was Karl Bowen — dead I A knife
in his neck.

T IEUTENANT QUEST took one
look at Bowen’s cold corpse. His
lips tightened grimly as he whirled
about and hurried from the cannery.
“I’m getting Meungl” he said.

Instead of following the lean Cana-
dian, I stooped and went through the
dead explorer’s pockets. He hadn’t
been searched. His killer had prob-
ably been in too much of a hurry to
get away. In his passport I found a
series of newspaper clippings taken
from British, Canadian, German, Nor-

want the whole of the unexplored Arc-
tic r

Hodar stared at me for a second.
“That’s fantastic,” he said. “No com-
pany is mad enough to try developing
the polar regions. It can’t be done.”

I snapped my fingers suddenly.
“Hodar,” I said. “Bowen was an Arc-
tic explorer. He must have found
something because there’s a connection.
Remember the Lisbon meeting of
world diplomats. The Arctic question
was brought up there. But what the
hell is it? There’s a natural connec-
tion between that meeting, Meung and
the murder of Bowen.”

“But what’s behind it all?”

“I don’t know, Hodar. But I think
it’s a big case, bigger than we’ve ever
tackled and I’ve a feeling the United
States will be dragged into it.”

“Why the U.S.?”

“Because, haven’t you noticed, every
time I get in on a case it seems to be
my destiny to protect American inter-
ests?” I think Hodar expected me to
whistle a bar from Yankee Doodle at
this point. Instead, I started for the
door. “We’re going to Meung’s place
to get Quest,” I said. “I don’t think
we’ll find Meung by himself.”

wegian and Swedish newspapers.

Reading several of them with Ho- T IEUTENANT QUEST was swear-
dar’s help, I saw that they had one ing a blue streak and hurriedly
thing in common, an amazing factor, searching Meung’s apartment over the
The articles gave news of an Arctic Malemute Bar when we arrived.
Development Corporation which had “He’s gone,” snapped Quest,
petitioned the various world govern- “You needn’t search the place,” I
ments holding claims in the North for replied. “He probably took whatever
trading franchise rights. needed taking. Wasn’t much. Hodar

“Do you see what I see?” I asked searched here before ”

Hodar. “Not one of the petitions asked It was then I noticed that Quest
for trading franchises in Alaska, North- wasn’t looking at me. He was staring
em Canada or Greenland. The Arctic past me. I whirled almost on a dime
Development Corporation asks for and stood face to face with the rather
trading and developing rights in unex- buxom cafe girl who had been part of
plored territory, absolutely frozen ter- Meung’s poker team.
ritory where people can’t live. They “Hello, little guy," she smiled at me.

OSCAR AND THE TALKING TOTEMS

145

As she stepped into the room, eying
Quest and Hodar with frank apprais-
ing glances, I got a whiff of her per-
fume. Boy, did it say things.

“Who are you?” Quest demanded.
The girl shrugged her shoulders.
“You can call me, Lou, big boy.” She
smiled again. “I suppose you’re look-
ing for Meung, that rat?”

“What do you know about him?”
Quest shot at her.

“I know he’s gone, ain’t he? He run
out on me, the rat. Try to give me the
double cross for another skirt, will he?
Maybe you don’t know he just killed
this Bowen guy. You want> to know
where he went, huh? Well I’ll spill it.”
“Go ahead,” snapped Quest.

“So Meung ran out on me, with a
doll,” said the woman named Lou. An
angry, jealous tone entered her voice.
“Well, he’s headed Eastward with a
dog team and a dozen rifles. He went
off with that doll, Jane Lee.”

“Jane Lee—” Quest gasped.

“Yeah, that’s her,” replied the cafe
girl. “Maybe she can tell you why this
explorer guy was rubbed out — if you
can catch her!”

CHAPTER V
The To+ems Talk

THRIVING eastward toward Norton
the sea cuts in to the right of the
Seward Peninsula. It’s a loijg, desolate
expanse of snow covered tundra, the
barren white slopes marred only by the
fringe of thundering ice floes along the
Norton Sound shore.

The vague, sickly light of a new and
shorter day was just breaking. It found
us, Lieutenant Quest and me, miles
from Nome in the midst of the vast and
bleak snow country. Behind us was
the winding trail slashed in the snow
by our sledge and team of yapping hus-
kies. Ahead, there was nothing but

unrelieved whiteness.

“We’re still seventy miles from Nor-
ton and we’ve lost their trail. They
may have headed for there then
changed their direction,” said Lieuten-
ant Quest.

“I’m about dead,” I muttered.

I was, actually. A great deal had
happened since the previous evening
when we had discovered Bowen mur-
dered and that Jane Lee had run off
with Meung. We had decided to give
chase. Quest and I were to take a dog
team while Hodar remained in Nome
to watch things.

Before starting I had made a little
fur cap for my tulip nose because it
was so sensitive to the cold. Little did
I realize at the time that this would
cause us some delay and trouble. Then,
like mad cheechakos * we mushed out
of Nome into the teeth of a frigid north
wind.

Throughout the long night, as we
pushed ahead, driving the dogs like
madmen, we passed an endless parade
of Totem poles. They were-planted all
over the peninsula. There were so
many they even got on Quest’s nerves.
Toward morning something else hap-
pened and it almost finished me. . . .
The fur cap on my nose!

A band of migratory Eskimos, hunt-
ing in the night along the Norton Sound
shore, spotted me. Unlike Quest, I
didn’t wear a parka and boots. My ex-
tremely heavy Martian skin which is
proof against bullets is also proof
against cold, but on my nose I had the
little fur cap. The Eskimos took me
for a strange sort of animal.

For twenty minutes I scurried wildly
up and down ice floes and across the
tundra, the Eskimos hot on my heels
with harpoons. Finally Quest suc-
ceeded in cutting them off, dumping me
exhausted into the sledge and whipping

♦Eskimo for greenhorn.

146

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

the dogs ahead so mercilessly that we
out-distanced them. That was how we
lost Meung’s trail.

But dead as I felt, I became suddenly
alert. I sensed a reaction in our lead
husky as the sledge skimmed down a
slough slope. Then I noticed the cave.

Our dogs immediately stopped, their
tails and heads lowered like wolves,
their formidable hackles rising stiffly,
low menacing snarls rising in their
throats.

“Something there,” Quest observed
quickly.

He drew his revolver and moved for-
ward into the shadows of the cave. I
noticed as we crept forward that there
were no sledge marks. Naturally the
driving wind had swept fresh snow over
any such traces.

“Place is empty,” I heard Quest say.

T PUSHED in beside him. The low

cave was indeed empty but there
were signs of life for a moss fire still
smoldered and the smell of cooked food
clung to the air.

“Maybe a party of Eskimos,” said
Quest. “Smells like a pup seal was
roasted.”

The Lieutenant squatted upon the
floor, his flashlight brushing here and
there. It was clear that the party
which had camped here was quite large,
not just a girl and a man. There were
bones spread over quite an area — seal
bones.

Quest picked up one of the bones,
then another. He sucked in his breath.
“Whoever camped here weren’t native
Eskimos,” he said. “They were either
half-breeds or whites.”

I started to take my nose cap off to
do a little investigating myself when
Quest grinned at me.

“Don’t bother about smells,” he said.
“These bones are proof enough. Native
Eskimos break open the seal bones and

eat the marrow. White men can’t stand
the taste — too strong.”

“So. We’re on the trail. Let’s go.”
“Take it easy,” Quest warned. “If
Meung and Jane Lee were here, they’ve
picked up some company. Armed com-
pany I”

When we stood out in the snows
again and headed our dog team on to-
ward Norton, we moved more warily.
The day had grown intensely white.
We mushed from slough to slough,
keeping in hollows as much as possible
to avoid being seen first if Meung
should be ahead.

It was when we drove into one such
hollow that I yelled to Quest to stop
the dogs. Directly in front stood an-
other of those grotesque Totems. It
was huge — a crudely carved series of
leering images, fifty feet high and some
three feet in diameter. This time I
was positive. The thing was fairly
shouting at me. To Quest’s utter amaze-
ment I began circling around the To-
tem, sniffing up and down like a dog
getting friendly with a tree.

“Great Martian Gods I” I finally
shouted in a dither of excitement.
“Those Totems were all talking to me.
I was dense. I didn’t get it. They
were talking with odors.”

“Are you crazy?” Quest cut in.
“Crazy I” I cried. "I was crazy not
to have sensed this before. This Totem
foie is hollow / It’s filled with trinitro-
glycerin I Enough to blow the land
away from here over a twenty mile
area.”

“What?”

“That’s right. And all those other
poles we saw are filled with trinitro-
glycerin. There’s enough to blow up
the entire Seward Peninsula. My nose
smelled the nitro odor and I thought
the things were talking to me.”
“That’s too fantastic,” Quest
frowned. He took an axe from the

OSCAR AND THE TALKING TOTEMS

147

sledge and started to swing on the pole.
“We’ll see,” he said.

“UEY! Stop!” I screamed. “This
stuff is touchy. It might go off
at the slightest shock.”

“But we’ve got to know.”

“Listen, Quest. Take my word for
it. My tulip nose never fails. I’m just
sorry I wasn’t on the alert. I should
have realized about these Totems
sooner. Remember our ship? It car-
ried drums of nitric and sulphuric acids.
Remember the cannery? We saw the
same acids there, and vats of a sirupy
liquid, glycerin. . . .

“Well, I see it all now. Trinitro-
glycerin is too dangerous an explosive
to ship to Alaska overseas. Also, who-
ever is planting this stuff didn’t want
it known that Alaska was being turned
into a powder keg. They shipped the
chemicals separately. At the cannery
we visited, and maybe at others, they
mixed the acids then put the stuff in
the convertor or nitrator.”

“The what? Where?” asked Quest
still amazed.

“The nitrator,” I said impatiently.
“Those big lead drums incased in wood
We saw them in the cannery. The acids
work on the glycerin. All they needed
was a compressor and a cooling sys-
tem.”

“But damn it I What’s the meaning
of it?” snapped Quest.

I caught my breath. I was no longer
looking at the Lieutenant. Coming over
the snowy ridge above us, I saw two
sledges and a dozen men racing toward
us.

“Meung — ” I shouted.

Almost immediately, a rifle shot
zinged past us and threw up a white
powder of snow as it hit near the Totem
pole,

“Look out! Get away from here.
Got to draw their fire,” I commanded

frantically as I grabbed the Lieutenant
and we ran away from the Totem. If
one bullet hit that pole — well, let’s not
think about it!

Quest snatched a rifle from the
sledge and we dropped in the snow
some fifty yards from the Totem. Bul-
lets sang by our ears in a deadly mel-
ody. Quest pumped away with the rifle
and I with his revolver. Two . . .
three men dropped. Still Meung’s party
came on.

Their fire was deadly and heavy.
There was only one thing we could do
for the odds were five to one against us.
I stood up and faced the attack. Quest
knelt behind me, sheltered by my bul-
let proof skin. . . . And did the bul-
lets ricochet off me!

“Look,” yelled Quest, “they’re break-
ing up.”

Meung’s men were spreading out.
Some were running. Then I saw
through their strategy. “Breaking up,
yeah. But they’re circling us. We’re
trapped!” I muttered.

The attackers slowly closed in,
crawling over the snow, kneeling to fire.
I could make out the faces of the half-
breeds and Meung. In the sledge, I
saw Jane Lee.

Suddenly I heard a rifle report on
our right. Lieutenant Quest gasped
and stiffened, falling on his side. He
grabbed his side with tensed fingers.

“Got it in the ribs,” he said grimly.
“Bleeding. Guess we’re done for. Too
much odds.”

CHAPTER Yi

Secret of the Bering Sea

“TJTERE. Take this and keep firing!”
I said as I shoved the pistol into
his hand. “I’ve got my own way of
fixing the odds.”

I pulled a little copper tube from my

148

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

pocket. An object which I’ve carried
with me and guarded zealously since
the night I first appeared upon Earth.
It’s a Martian gadget. You’ll never
see one like it on Earth.

“They’ll be on us in a minute, Os-
car,” Quest gritted. “You’d better run
while you’ve got a chance to break
through. I’ll cover you. Warn them
in Nome about the Totems!”

I had my gadget ready. It was a gun.
I inserted three dull silver pellets into
it then fired at points equidistant be-
tween Meung’s advancing breeds and
ourselves. The results were amazing.
Of course I knew what I was doing, but
the results were still amazing by any
earthly standards.

Quest took one dazed look and al-
most fainted. We were surrounded by
a screen of vari-colored, shimmering
smoke which spread from the snow
where my pellets had struck. Through
the encircling smoke screen Meung’s
men could be seen — not nine cut throat
half-breeds, but more than ninety of
them.

“He’s got an army now,” Quest
gasped. “We haven’t got a bloody
chance.”

“Don’t let it get you down,” I
grinned. “Little trick of mine. Look
carefully through the smoke. You’ll
notice there are ten Meungs, not one.
The smoke particles, like particles of
moisture in a rainbow, refract images
and multiply them by ten. Right now
those half-breeds think they’re seeing
twenty of us. Ten Oscars and ten
Quests. Look!”

My words were already a proven
fact. The attacking breeds, not know-
ing the secret of my smoke screen, had
broken rank. Soon they were retreat-
ing in frantic confusion over the snowy
slope. Meung’s single voice could be
heard screaming at them, but vainly.
His ten refracted figures waved twenty

angry arms.

Just as Quest and I ran through the
hovering image-screen toward his two
sledges, we saw the Gambler leap to-
ward the one in which Jane Lee strug-
gled. He had gone mad! He jerked
out his revolver and held it against the
girl’s head.

In the same instant there was a
thundering roar in my ears. An angry
flash of flame burst past my head. I
saw Meung pitch forward over the
sledge while clawing at his chest. At
my side, Lieutenant Quest, lowered his
gun.

“He’ll never move again,” Quest
muttered. “He’s dead, unless he just
didn’t have any heart to shoot outl”

As we reached the sledge and
dragged the dead man’s body aside, we
found Jane Lee crying. Then I no-
ticed that she was bound and gagged.

J ANE told her story a little later. It
was while we were in the cave where
the seal bones had been discovered. We
had returned there to build a fire and
apply a little first aid to Lieutenant
Quests’s side where a bullet had nicked
his ribs.

In the firelight she gave us a warm
look, as if to say we were both saints.

“Please, Oscar,” she murmured.
“I’m as puzzled as you are. It’s all so
horrible. I don’t know why Meung
kidnapped me. All I know is that I
received a message saying Jack Wil-
liams was hurt and that I should come
to the Nome airport. When I arrived,
I was thrown into the sledge and kid-
napped. Does Jack know what hap-
pened?”

I nodded thoughtfully. “Yes. Hodar
was instructed to contact him. Williams
has probably rounded up the whole
Chamber of Commerce who by now
ought to be out looking for you.”

Jane Lee reddened a little. “I guess

OSCAR AND THE TALKINS TOTEMS

149

I'm glad you rescued me instead of
Jack,” she murmured, glancing at Lieu-
tenant Quest.

“So?” I asked.

“Well . . . Fm not going to marry
Jack,” Jane answered hesitantly. He’s
. . . well, we just don’t get along to-
gether. He’s too much of a business
man. He’s not adventurous.” Again
Jane glanced at Quest.

I shrugged. This was no business of
mine. If I were Jack Williams, I’d
bust her on the nose. A girl who doesn’t
appreciate a man who can plunk down
ten thousand dollars to finance a small
expedition ought to have something
done to her. But Earthwomen are like
that, unpredictable.

“Where was Meung heading for?” I
asked.

“For Norton, then Ruby,” Jane an-
swered.

I picked up a heavy envelope which
we had found in one of Meung’s
sledges. I remembered having seen a
map in it when I had picked it up after
rescuing Jane. “Why Norton Bay; or
why Ruby?" I murmured. “Have a
look at the map.”

Spreading the contents of the en-
velope on the cavern floor I noticed
something peculiar. In addition to the
map, there was a chart that showed
only the Seward Peninsula and a sheaf
of clipped papers in a handwriting
which I immediately recognized — Karl
Bowen’s.

I paged through the papers excitedly.
I sensed danger. My reaction was any->
thing but far fetched. The stuff was
almost incredible.

“Listen, Quest I Here’s the answer
to everything,” I gasped. “These are
the result of Bowen’s years in the Arc-
tic. Just listen to this! He’s worked
out a theory that ij the Bering Straits
are widened, blasted open, by eliminat-
ing the Seward Peninsula and St. Law-

rence Island the Japanese Warm Cur-
rents would flow into the Arctic Seat
“Do you understand what that
means? Listen to this I I’ll read right
from Bowen’s notes:”

J COULD scarcely hold the page up
to read it, I was so excited.

‘“If the Japanese Current were to
flow into the Polar seas instead of de-
flecting toward California, the polar
icecap wotdd melt, revealing new land
masses. The Arctic would become an
Eden capable of supporting millions of
people.’ ”*

Quest snapped up some of the notes.
His eyes blinked dazedly. “M-M-My
God I” he stuttered. “Everything’s
here. The figures on how far the warm
current would penetrate; on how wide
the Straits should be blasted. There’s
even an estimate on the tonnage of
trinitroglycerin needed for the job.”

I looked at Bowen’s map of the Sew-
ard Peninsula. There were little red
marks indicating where such explosive
charges would have to be set off to to-
tally destroy the peninsula. Then I
noticed that little, hastily sketched
totem poles had been added to the map
in a hand that was obviously not Bow-
en’s.

Bowen’s theory of blasting the narrow 35 mile
Bering Straits bottle neck is no idle dream. Such
a continental WPA project requiring the removal
of Nome, the upheaval of the Seward P enins ula
and St. Lawrence Island to allow the Japanese
Current into the Polar area was first envisioned
by the late Charles P. Steinmetz, electrical and
mathematical wizard of the General Electric Com-
pany.

Steinmetz left complete plans and estimates on
how the job should be done. For money it
would cost approximately what it costs to run
the present war for one year. The amazing theory
for world face-lifting would, according to scien-
tists, create an ice-free Northwest Passage, double
the habitable area of the world, modify the cli-
matic conditions of the whole of North America,
causing a milder, more productive climate. The
Arctic region would have a climate similar to
that of Northern California and Washington. — Ed.

150

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

“Those Totems I” I said, leaping to
my feet as though an electric charge
had jolted through me. “The trinitro-
glycerin! It's already planted. They’re
going to blow up the Peninsula — right
out from under us. We’ve got to stop
them.”

“Stop who?” asked Jane.

“We killed Meung,” Quest inter-
rupted. “He was behind it. That
much is clear.”

I shot an ironic glance at the Lieu-
tenant. “There’s still someone behind
Meung. He was just a cog in the busi-
ness. We’ve still got to face the chief
of the Arctic Development Corpora-
tion. That’s the outfit behind this. Re-
member the trading concessions they
petitioned for. Why, they were out to
cut the throat of every government
holding legitimate claims in the Arctic
Circle.”

“But who is it?” Quest looked mysti-
fied.

“I’ve got a general idea,” I said.
“But that’s got to wait. There are
Totems filled with explosives all over
this frozen land and someone capable
of setting them off. We’ve got to stop
it. But how? The Totems aren’t
wired. In fact, how were they going
to be set off in the first place?”

I paced the floor and put my mind to
work. I cut every unnecessary thought
and sensation from my being for a full
five minutes. I didn’t even notice how
Jane Lee’s hand crept into Quest’s
sturdy palm until I suddenly whirled
upon her.

“Has Jack Williams got a plane?” I
asked.

Jane gave a little start and blushed.

“Yes, Jack’s got three planes. He
uses them for his trading business.”

“Good,” I said. “We’re going to clip
the Arctic Development Corporation’s
wings. I just hope those planes are in
Nome. Come on. Mushl”

nr HE long trek back to Nome was a
A harrowing experience for all three
of us. We whipped the last ounce of
energy out of the dog teams as we raced
over the frozen tundras. It was a race
against nerves and time. At any mo-
ment the Peninsula was due to surge
up beneath us in the most cataclysmic
upheaval imaginable.

As we drove past the innumerable
explosive filled Totem poles that dotted
the barren land, we experienced the
most damning feeling of desperate help-
lessness. We were surrounded by death
and we could do no more than drive our
dog teams at a more maddening pace.

With nerves almost shot and muscles
crying out in protest against the in-
human task put to them, we finally
staggered into Nome’s bleak airport.
Another dawn was already breaking as
the panting, bleary-eyed dogs pulled up
at the squat administration building.

Quest, barely able to stand himself,
carried Jane into the building where a
red-bellied stove gave off an almost in-
fernal heat.

I grabbed a sleepy eyed field at-
tendant and got him to tell me where
Jack Williams’ planes were. Luck was
with me again. The three planes had
been taken from their hangars and were
moored on the field, their motors warm-
ing up. Williams had telephoned the
airport, but fifteen minutes past, order-
ing the planes out to take part in the
search for Jane Lee.

“Water,” I said. “I want buckets
of water quick.”

The attendant looked at me queerly.
He pointed at a couple of buckets
against the wall.

What I did then will be talked about
for the next ten years in Nome. Heed-
less of the intense sub-zero cold, I
rushed bucket after bucket of water out
to Williams’ planes. The water, when
it splashed against my legs, froze al-

OSCAR AND THE TALKING TOTEMS

151

most instantly. Hastily, I dumped each
bucket in the snow when I reached the
planes. Crazy! Well, maybe I was.
But I went back and repeated the busi-
ness all over again.

Finished with that fantastic job, I
ran into the administration building
office where Quest and Jane had been
watching me through the window.

“What the hell are you doing? Wa-
ter won’t stop trinitroglycerin. It’ll
freeze before we take off,” said Quest.

“Don’t worry,” I said. “Oscar has
it all in control.” I picked up a phone
from the desk and called the United
States Marshal’s office in town.

The connection came through in a
moment.

“Hello, Marshal, this is Oscar.
Yeah, Oscar the Martian Detective.”
I hugged the phone to my ear. “Yeah,
Marshal, just got back. Got all the
dope on the St. Lawrence mystery.
Now listen. Something worse is going
to happen if we don’t work fast. The
Seward Peninsula and Nome may be
blown up . .

I heard a few gurgling sounds at the
other end of the line.

“Listen Marshal,” I barked into the
phone, “Round up every man in Nome
who owns a pair of snowshoes and a
dog team. Get all the slack lime you can
and start pouring it on the Totem poles
in Nome. They’re filled with nitro-
glycerin. Slack lime kills it. I’ll be
over in a minute with a map showing
you where the rest of the stuff is bur-
ied.”

T BARELY hung the ear piece on the
A hook when I felt myself collapse in
a chair. The pace was too hot.

“The Marshal can’t locate all those
nitro deposits in three days,” said
Quest. “We’ll be blown up before
that.”

“Stop worrying,” I answered peev-

ishly. “I know who’s behind this busi-
ness and we’ll stop him.”

A door slammed behind me; then a
voice spoke with the chilling sharpness
of a dagger stabbing into my back, say-
ing, “So you know all about it? Well,
try stopping me now!”

In the chair at my side, I saw Jane
Lee look up, her eyes framed with be-
wilderment that quickly changed to
horror. “Jack — ,” she screamed.

Jack Williams stood at the office
door, staring at us coldly. Behind him
were three very tough looking men in
furs. They wore pilot’s goggles pushed
up upon their foreheads. One of them
carried a sub-machine gun. The ugly
black barrel was leveled upon me.

I grinned at Williams. “Sort of ex-
pecting you,” I said. “Not quite this
soon though.”

“Shut up!” snapped Williams. He
swerved Jhis glance toward Jane. “Too
bad you learned about this so soon,” he
said idly. “Sorry. I can’t trust women
who know too much. You’re going to
take it along with your detective
friends.”

Lieutenant Quest took a step for-
ward, his eyes burning angrily at Wil-
liams.

“Leave her out of this, Williams,” he
growled. “And put that gun down.
I’ll—.”

“Jim!” It was Jane Lee. Her eyes
held a terrified and frantic appeal as
she threw herself in front of Lieutenant
Quest.

“Cut the hysterics!” Williams spoke
evenly, as he and his men backed
through the door. “You’ll have time for
them when we drop a few bombs from
our plane.”

The door slammed shut. In the
same instant Quest threw his weight
against it but he was too late. The key
had turned in the lock.

“Damn it, Oscar,” he shouted.

152

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

“They’re going to bomb the nitro de-
posits. My God, they can set off the
whole peninsula in a few hours with
three planes!”

CHAPTER VII

Citizen Oscar

J ANE LEE stood by the window. Her
lips moved in silent terror and her
eyes, frozen with horror, were fixed
upon the flying field. The landing
lights had been switched on, flooding
the flat ground with a brilliant white-
ness.

Out on the field Williams and his
three flying gunmen ran toward their
planes. They stopped for a moment
to intercept the astonished field atten-
dant, jab a gun into his ribs and hurry
him toward the planes. '

“Look out!” hissed Lieutenant Quest
as he pushed Jane away from the win-
dow.

He raised the butt end of a rifle,
smashing the glass in the windows. An-
other blow splintered the wooden
frames. Quest heaved himself over the
sill, heedless of the saw-toothed frag-
ments of glass. “Come Oscar,” he
yelled. Suddenly he stopped, staring
at me queerly.

Of course, I don’t blame him. We
were in a tough spot. Williams and his
men had held us up just long enough
so they could get to their planes. In
those planes there were bombs. That
was how they planned to set off the
nitro filled Totem poles. The slightest
jar from a bomb would touch off entire
strings of such poles for one explosion
would act as a percussion cap for an-
other.

“Oscar — Quest practically roared.
I looked back at him and grinned as
dapperly as I could. I was sitting in a
swivel chair, my feet up on the desk, as

quiet as you please.

“They’ve reached the planes,” Jane
cried. “It’s too late now.”

Out across the field the smooth roar
of engines could be heard. That was
just what I had been waiting for. I
swiveled my chair so as to face Quest.

“Okay, T entente” I snapped. “Get
out there in the field and cover the
cabin doors of the planes. Shoot the
first man that steps out I ”

Quest sort of sucked his breath in, as
though he thought I were completely
mad.

I reached across the desk and
grabbed up the phone. “United States
Marshal’s office!” I barked into the
mouthpiece. I listened a moment,
then the connection was made. “Hello,
Marshal,” I said. “Oscar, again. Lis-
ten, there are four crazy men out here
at the airport. They’re trying to take
off in planes.”

“What?” came the Marshal’s voice.

“That’s right,” I said. “They’re try-
ing to take off in planes and the plane
skis are frozen solid to the ground.”

“Frozen?” asked the Marshal.

“Sure,” I grinned. “Frozen. You
know how it is. You dump buckets of
water. The stuff freezes. Yeah. Send
a posse out immediately.”

npHE Nome Chamber of Commerce
A did a very unique thing the evening
after we captured Jack Williams. The
business men took over the Malemute
Bar and threw a banquet for me. The
Malemute was the biggest place in town
and most of the town was there.

During the eating and drinking I did
my best to explain to newspaper repor-
ters what a swell job the U.S. Marshal
and his men had done in capturing Wil-
liams after Lieutenant Quest had cor-
nered them in the three planes.

We had gotten a full confession from
Williams. We had the names of all his

OSCAR AND THE TALKING TOTEMS

153

confederates, and he had plenty. Then
the Marshal and his men worked dou-
ble-time pulling down the deadly Totem
poles, neutralizing their explosive
charges with slacklime.

“How come none of the poles ex-
ploded while they were up?” asked one
of the reporters. “Trinitroglycerin is
sensitive stuff. A feather can explode
it, I hear.”

“That,” I smiled, “was a long chance
I banked on when Quest and I first dis-
covered the stuff. Nitro has a low
freezing point but the Alaska weather
is lower. When frozen, nitro is less
sensitive stuff.

One of the reporters glanced at Jane.

“But why did this Meung fellow kid-
nap her?” the reporter asked.

“Wouldn’t you?” I grinned.

“Come on, Oscar, the lowdown,” an-
other reporter cut in.

I smiled again. I tried looking across
the table toward the Marshal but with
my four feet five inches I couldn’t see
over the stack of greenbacks — $50,000
worth — which the Chamber of Com-
merce had presented to Hodar, Quest
and me.

“Okay,” I told the reporters. “The
Marshal’s busy tracking some sand in
his salad so here’s the dope. There’s
a reason for Jane having been kid-
napped. A very important point. But
I’ll start at the beginning. . . .

“nPHIS whole business of blasting a
three hundred mile wide channel
in the Bering Straits is a swell idea, but,
only if responsible governments handle
the job. Our Arctic Development Com-
pany didn’t work this way though.
They were a bunch of shrewd and not
very patriotic financiers. They figured
that while the world was at war it was
the time to horn in and do their dirt.
They stole Bowen’s plans which he in-
tended turning over to the United

States Government. . .

“Yeah, what’s happening to them?”
a reporter cut in.

“A brief of the case has been sent to
the various governments so that they
can deal with those fifth columnists.”

“And Williams was the head of it?”

I nodded. “Yes. He didn’t put up
much money, but he was the brains be-
hind it. It was his idea to ship the acids
and glycerin into Alaska separately to
avoid arousing suspicion. Meung was
just his henchman and go-between.
When Meung got in trouble after kill-
ing the cabin steward aboard ship, then
Bowen, he had to get out of Nome. . . .

“But he wasn’t taking any chances
letting Williams double cross him. So
he stole Bowen’s plans from Williams
and kidnapped Jane Lee. The kid-
napping convinced me Williams was in
on the plot ! Why else did Meung want
a girl he hardly knew? It was to have
something over Williams’ head so the
latter wouldn’t double cross. The only
trouble was, he didn’t know Williams
and the girl were on the verge of break-
ing up.”

Someone tugged on my arm. It was
the roly-poly president of the Cham-
ber of Commerce. “Here, Oscar old
pal. A telegram,” he said.

“Thanks Bodkins,” I murmured as
I tore the envelope open. Some of
the reporters crowded around, reading
over my shoulder as I opened the letter.

DEAR OSCAR:

CONGRATULATIONS ON YOUR LATEST
SUCCESS. WE HEREBY CONFER FULL AND
IMMEDIATE CITIZENSHIP UPON YOU.
BUREAU OF IMMIGRATION HAS ESTAB-
LISHED A QUOTA OF IMMIGRATION INTO
THE UNITED STATES FOR ONE MARTIAN.
(Signed) THE PRESIDENT OF THE U.S A.
THE CONGRESS
THE CABINET

“Hodar!” I shouted, leaping from
my chair. “Now I can votel”

HOK

VISITS THE LAND OF LEGENDS

O NLY Hok could have done it —
only Hok the Mighty, strong-
est and wisest and bravest of
the Flint Folk whose chief he was.
For Gragru the mammoth was in those
days the noblest of all beasts hunted
by man — to bring one down was an
enterprise for the combined hunter-
strength of a tribe. Save for Hok, no
man would even think of killing Gragru
single-handed.

But Hok had so thought. And for
Hok, to think was to do. When winter’s
heaviest snow had choked the meadows
and woods that Hok’s people had won
by battle from the half-beastly
Gnorrls,* he put his plan into action.

Not that food was scarce. A late
flight of geese had dropped flounder-
ing on the frozen river before the vil-
lage of mud huts, and Hok’s sturdy
young son Ptao had led the other chil-
dren to seize them. Hok’s brother
Zhik had traced a herd of elk to their
stamped-out clearing in a willow thick-
et, and was planning a raid thither.
But Hok’s big blond head teemed with
great thoughts, his blue eyes seemed
to gaze on far distances of the spirit.
Already he thought of such game as
trivial.

On a cloudy gray day, not too cold,
he spoke from his cave-door in the
bluff above the huts. “I go on a lone
hunt," he told the tribe. “It will be
several days, perhaps, before I return.

♦See “Battle in the Dawn”, “Hok Draws the
Bow”, etc. Amazing Stories, January, ’39, and
May, ’40. — Ed.

In my absence, Zhik is your chief.”
Then he gave his handsome wife Oloana
a rib-buckling hug, and told young Ptao
to grow in his absence. He departed
along the river trail, heading south for
mammoth country.

His big, tall body was dressed in fur
from throat to toe. His long shanks
wore tight-wound wolfskin leggings, fur
inside. His moccasins, of twofold bi-
son leather, had tops reaching almost
to his knees, and were plentifully tal-
lowed against wet. His body was
wrapped in the pelt of a cave-lion, arms
fitting inside the neatly skinned fore-
legs, mane muffling his neck and chest.
Fox-fur gloves protected his hands.
All openings and laps were drawn snug
by leather laces. Only his great head,
with golden clouds of hair and beard,
was defiantly bare to winter.

Leaving the village, Hok paused to
strap his feet into rough 3nowshoes.*
The Flint Folk had developed such
things by watching how nature made
broad the feet of hare, ptarmigan and
lynx to glide on top of the snow. Hok’s
weapons were a big bow of yew, a
quiver of arrows, a big keen axe of
blue flint. At his side hung a sizeable
deerskin pouch, full of hunter’s gear
and provisions.

Away he tramped, his blue eyes
scanning the horizon. Far off was
a black bison, snow-swamped, with
wolves closing in. Nearer, gaunt

* Professor Katherine E. Dopp and others have
pointed out the absolute necessity for the inven-
tion of snowshoes by Stone Age hunters of Hok’s
time. — Ed.

154

MANLY WADE

Jhere was a country even Hok
the Caveman had never dared
visit until now. It was the land
of awful legend and fear!

Va'/jGB

ravens sawed over a frost-killed deer.
Winter was the hungry season — eat or
be eaten was its byword. Hok’s people
would eat plentifully of Gragru’s car-
cass. . . . Hok journeyed west and

Hok thrust Oloana back, and leaped
forward, stone axe in his ready hand

south, to where he had once noted a
grove of pine and juniper.

It was all of a morning and part of
the afternoon before Hok reached the
grove. He smiled over nearby mam-

156

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

moth tracks, large enough for him to
curl up in. The prey had been there.
It would return. He began prepara-
tions.

He set up headquarters in the center
of the grove, scooping out a den in the
snow and laying branches above it for
roof. His bow and arrows he hung to
a big pine trunk, away from damp.
Then, axe in hand, he sought out a
springy red cedar, felled it and trimmed
away the branches. Dragging it to his
camp, Hok laboriously hewed and whit-
tled it into a great bow-stave, twice as
long as himself and thicker at the mid-
point than his brawny calf, with the
two ends properly tapered.

JD ENDING the bow was a task for
even Hok. From his bag he took
a great coil of rawhide rope, several
strands thick. With a length of this he
lashed the bow horizontally to the big
pine. To each end he fastened a sec-
ond line, making this fast to a tree be-
hind, After that, he toiled to bend one
arm, then the other, using all his braced
strength and weight and shortening
each lashing. The stout cedar bent little
by little into a considerable curve.

Next Hok affixed his bowstring of
rawhide, first soaking it in slush. When
it was as tight as he could make it, he
lighted a row of fires near it. As the
string dried and shrank in the heat,
the bow bent still more.

Meanwhile, Hok was cutting an ar-
row to fit that bow, a pine sapling thrice
the length of his leg. From his pouch
he produced a flint point longer than
his foot, flaked to a narrow, sharp apex.
This he lashed into the split tip, and
with his axe chopped a notch in the
opposite butt. The finished arrow he
laid across his big bow.

“My weapon is ready to draw for
killing,” he said with satisfaction, and
put himself to new toil. A lashing of

rope held the arrow notched on the
string, and Hok carried the end of this
new lashing backward, around a stump
directly to the rear. With braced feet,
swelling muscles, panting chest, he
heaved and slaved and outdid himself
until the bow was drawn to the fullest
and his pull-rope hitched firmly to the
anchorage. He stepped back and
proudly surveyed the finished work.
“Good!” he approved himself.

He had made and drawn a bow for
such a giant as his old mother had
spoken of, long ago in his childhood.
The big pine to which the bow was
bound stood for the archer’s rigid grip-
ping hand. The back-stretched rope
from the arrow’s notch was the draw-
ing hand. All that was needed would
be a target in front of it.

And Hok arranged for that.

He cut young, green juniper boughs
and made to heaps, three strides apart,
so that the arrow pointed midway be-
tween them. Then he hacked away
branches and bushes that might inter-
fere with the shaft’s flight. It was eve-
ning by now. He built up his fire be-
hind the drawn bow, toasted a bit of
meat from his pouch, and finally slept.

At dawn he woke. Snow was fall-
ing. Hok rose and gazed along the
little lane in front of the arrow.

There came the prey he hoped for.

Gragru the mammoth, tremendous
beyond imagination, marched with
heavy dignity to the enticing breakfast
Hok had set him. A hillock of red-
black hair, more than twice Hok’s
height at the shoulder,* he sprouted
great spiral tusks of creamy ivory, each
a weight for several men. His head, a
hairy boulder, had a high cranium and

♦This was a specimen of the Imperial Mam-
moth, which stood some 14 feet high. Partial
remains of such a giant can be seen at the
National Museum of Natural History in New
York City.— Ed.

HOK VISITS THE LAND OF LEGENDS

157

small, wise eyes. His long, clever trunk
sniffed at one stack of juniper, and
began to convey it to his mouth.*

Hok drew his keen dagger of reindeer
horn. The mammoth gobbled on, fin-
ished the first stack, then swung across
to the second.

Hok squinted a last time along the
arrow. It aimed at the exact point he
had hoped — the hair-thatched flank of
the beast. Hok set his knife to the
draw-rope — sliced the strands —

Bonng! With a whoop of freed
strength, the bow hurled its shaft. A
heavy thud rang back, and Gragru
trumpeted in startled pain.

“You are my meat!” yelled Hok.

Gragru wheeled and charged the
voice. Hok caught his bow and arrows
from their hanging place, gathered the
snowshoes under his arm, and danced
nimbly aside. “I shot you!” he cried
again. “I, Hok!”

Blundering through the brush, Grag-
ru looked right and left for his enemy;
but Hok had sagely trotted around be-
hind him. A savage exploration of the
thicket, to no avail — then Gragru
sought the open again. His blood
streamed from wounds on either side
where the pine-shaft transfixed him, but
he still stood steady on his great* tree-
stump feet.

Hok came to the fringe of the juni-
pers. “You shall not escape!” he yelled
at the mammoth. “Hok will eat you!”

npHIS time Gragru did not charge.

He knew that death had smitten
through hair and hide and bone, to the
center of his lungs. No time left for
combat or revenge — time only for one
thing, the thing that every mammoth
must do in his last hour. . . .

* Examination of the stomachs of frozen mam-
moth remains has enabled scientists to decide on
juniper as a favorite article of their winter diet.
—Ed.

He turned and struggled away south-
ward through the snow.

Hok watched. He remembered the
stories of his fathers.

“Gragru seeks the dying place of
the mammoth, the tomb of his people,
that no man has ever seen or found.*
I shall follow him to that place — learn
the secret and mystery of where the
mammoth goes to die!”

Quickly he bound on his snow-shoes,
gained the top of the drifts, and forged
away after Gragru, now a diminishing
brown blotch in the middle distance.

CHAPTER II
Where Gragru Died

P* VEN the elephant, degenerate mod-
ern nephew of Gragra’s race, can
outrun a good horse on a sprint or a
day’s march; and the beast Hok now
followed was among the largest and
most enduring of his kind. Despite
the wound, the shaft in his body, and
the deep snow, Gragru ploughed ahead
faster than Hok’s ‘best pace.

The tall chieftain, however, had a
plain trail to follow — a deep rut in the
snow, with splotches and spatters of
blood. “Gragru shall not escape,” he
promised himself, and mended his
stride. The rising wind, bearing more
snowflakes, blew at his wide shoulders
and helped him along. Ahead was a
ravine, its central watercourse many
men’s height deep under old snows.
Gragru sagely churned along one slope,
into country more than a day’s journey
from Hok’s village. Hok had hunted
there only a few times.

*A similar legend is told about modern ele-
phants and their “graveyard”— -it is a fact that
bodies of naturally dead elephants are seldom
seen. The great beds of mammoth fossils in
Russia, from which as much as 100,000 pounds
of ivory was gleaned annually in pre-Soviet times,
may bear out Hok’s belief. — Ed.

158

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

They travelled thus, hunter and
hunted, all morning and all afternoon.
Evening came, and Hok did not pause
for a campfire, but gnawed a strip of
dried meat as he marched. His long-
est pause was to melt snow between
his ungloved hands for drink. Then on
into the dusk. The clouds broke a
little, and the light of a half-moon
showed him the trail of Gragru.

With the coming of night he heard
the howl of winter-famished wolves be-
hind. They were hunting him, of
course.* The safety of a tree, or at
least a rock-face to defend his back,
was the dictate of discretion; but Hok
very seldom was discreet. He paused
only long enough to cut a straight shoot
of ash, rather longer than himself.
Then, resuming his journey, he whit-
tled it to a point with his deerhom
knife. This improvised stabbing spear
he carried in his right hand, point back-
ward.

The howling chorus of the wolves
came nearer, stronger. It rose to a
fiendish din as they sighted Hok. He
judged that there were five or six, lean
and savage. Without slacking his pace,
he kept a watch from the tail of his eye.
As they drew close to his heels, several
gray forms slackened pace cautiously.
Not so the leader — he dashed full upon
Hok and sprang.

Hok had waited for that. Back
darted his reversed spear. The tough
ash pike met the wolf’s breast in mid-
air, the very force of the leap helped

* Hok’s people were contemporary with Cyan
alpinis fossils, a species of wolf-Jarger and stronger,
and probably fiercer, than modern types. Such
hunting animals must have had to pursue and drag
down the powerful game of the age, and would
not have shrunk too much from combat with man.
At least once among the remarkable art-works
of Stone Age man is included a painting of a
wolf — a lifelike polychrome on the wall of the
cavern at Font-de-Gaume, once the home and art
studio of a community of the magnificent Cro-
Magnons, Hok’s race. — Ed.

to Impale the brute. There rose one
wild scream of agony, and Hok let go
of the weapon, tramping along. Be-
hind rose a greedy hubbub — as he had
foreseen, the other wolves had stopped
and were devouring their fallen leader.

“The bravest often die like that,”
philosophized Hok, lengthening his
stride to make up fpr lost time.

The long ravine came to a head in
a frozen lake. Across this, to the south,
brush-clad hills. Gragru’s wallowing
trail showed how hard he found those
hills to climb, and Hok made up some
of the distance he had lost on the levels.
As the moon sank before morning, Hok
caught up. Gragru had paused to rest,
a great hunched hillock in a shaggy
pelt. Hok yelled in triumph and Grag-
ru, galvanizing into motion, slogged
away southward as before.

A NOTHER day — second of pursuit,
third of absence from home. Even
Hok’s magnificently trained legs must
begin to suffer from so much snowshoe-
ing; even Gragru’s teeming reservoir of
strength must run lower from pain and
labor. Given a chance to idle and nurse
himself, he could let the air clot and
congeal the wounds, but the shaft still
stuck through him, working and shift-
ing to begin fresh bleedings. The trail
now led through impeding thickets, and
after a brief spurt by Gragru, Hok had
a new advantage, that of using th«
mammoth’s lane through the heavy
drift-choked growth. By afternoon
more snow fell, almost a blizzard. Lest
he lose the trail entirely, Hok tramped
in Gragru’s very tracks instead of on
the firmer drifts beside.

“He weakens,” Hok told himself,
eyeing new blood blotches. “At this
point he rested on his knees. Yonder
he fell on his side. Brave beast, to
get up againl Will he reach the dying
place?”

HOK VISITS THE LAND OF LEGENDS

159

Full of admiration for Gragru, Hok
half-wished the animal would triumph,
but he did not slow down. Hok was
weary, but warm from his exertions
and far from faltering.

Night again. During the darkness
Hok again kept up a dogged march.
Up ahead somewhere, Gragru was
forced to make a halt of it. His wound
was doing its grim best to heal. Once
or twice the mammoth’s trunk reached
back and investigated that lodged
shaft. But there was too much wisdom
in that high crag of a skull to permit
tugging out of the painful thing — that
would mean bleeding to death on the
spot. Once again, as the deepest dark
heralded the dawn, Hok drew nigh to
his massive quarry. Once again Grag-
ru stirred to motion, breaking trail for
the third day of the chase.

The mighty stumpy feet were shak-
ing and stumbling by now. Gragru fell
again and again. He rose with diffi-
culty after each fall, groaning and puf-
fing but stubborn. A fresh hunter
might have caught up— but Hok, how-
ever much he would not admit it, was
himself close to the end of endurance.
His deep chest panted like a bullfrog’s.
He breathed through his mouth, and
the moisture made icicles in his golden
beard. Frost tried to bite his face,
and he rubbed it away with snow.
Only his conscious wisdom kept him
from tossing aside his Turs as too much
weight. By noon he made his first
rest-stop. Knowing better than to sit
down and grow stiff, he leaned his back
to a boulder and gulped air into his
laboring lungs. After he had paused
thus, and eaten a mouthful of meat,
he was no more than able to resume
the pursuit, at a stubborn walk.

“Gragru,” he addressed the fugitive
up ahead, “you are strong and brave.
Any man but Hok would say you had
conquered. But I have not given up.”

npHE afternoon’s journey led over a
great flat plain, rimmed afar by
white wrapped mountains and bearing
no trees or watercourses that showed
above the snow. Almost on its far side
was a gentle slope to a ridge, with a
peculiar length of shadow behind. Hok
saw Gragru ahead of him. The mam-
moth could barely crawl through the
drifts, sagging and trembling with
weakness. Hok drew on his own last
reserves of strength, stirred his aching
feet to swifter snowshoeing. He ac-
tually gained.

Narrower grew the distance between
them. Hok drew the axe from his belt,
balanced it in his gloved right hand.
Coming close, he told himself, he would
hack the tendon of Gragru’s hind leg,
bring him down to stay. After that,
get close enough to wrench out the
piercing shaft, so that a final loss of
blood would finish the beast. Then —
but Hok could wish only for camp, a
fire, sleep.

He toiled close. Closer. Gragru was
only fifty paces ahead, tottering to that
ridge of the slope. At its top he made
a slow, clumsy half-turn. His head
quivered between his big tussocked
shoulders, his ears and trunk hung
limply. His eyes, red and pained, fixed
upon Hok’s like the eyes of a warrior
who sees death upon him. Hok lifted
his axe in salute.

“Gragru, I am honored by this ad-
venture,” he wheezed. “Eating your
heart will give me strength and wit and
courage beyond all I have known. You
will live again in me. Now, (o make
an end.”

He kicked off the snowshoes, so as
to run more swiftly at Gragru’s sagging
hindquarters. But, before he moved,
Gragru acted on his own part. He
stretched his trunk backward to the
shaft in his wound.

Hok relaxed, smiling. “What, you

ISO

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

would die of your own will? So be itl
I yield you the honor of killing
Gragrul”

The mammoth’s trunk surged with
all the strength it had left. Fastening
on the head of the lance, it drew,
dragged, pulled the shaft clear through
and away. A flip of the trunk, and the
red-caked weapon flew out of sight be-
yond the ridge. Then, blood fountain-
ing forth on both sides, Gragru dragged
himself after the shaft. He seemed to
collapse beyond the ridge.

“He is mine,” muttered Hok Into the
icicles on his beard, and lifted his axe.
He ran in pursuit. So swift was he that
he did not see what was on the other
side of the ridge until too late.

There was no other side, really.
Ground shelved straight down from
that highest snow-dad point, into a
vast, deep valley. There was a drop
of eight or ten paces, then the begin-
ning of a steep muddy slope. Hok felt
a beating-up of damp warmth, like the
rush of air from a cave heated with
many fires. He saw thick, distant
greenery below him, with a blue mist
over it as of rain-clouds seen from a
mountain top. All this in one moment.

Then his moccasins slid from under
him on the brink, and he fell hard.

Striking the top of the slope all
sprawling, he rolled over and then slid
like an otter on a riverbank. Perhaps
something struck his head. Perhaps
he only dosed his eyes as he slid.

In any case, Hok dropped into sleep
as into warm water. He never even
felt himself strike a solid obstruction
and halt his downward slide.

CHAPTER III

The Jungle Beneath the Snow

T T OK stretched, yawned, opened his

A eyes. “Where have I fallen?” he

inquired of the world, and looked about
to answer his own question.

He had plumped into a great bushy
thicket of evergreen scrub, and had
lain there as comfortably as in a ham-
mock. By chance or instinct, he still
dutched his big flint axe. Above him
was the steep slope, and above that the
perpendicular cliff with a crowning of
snow. But all about him was a spring-
like warmth, with no snow at ail — only
dampness.

Hok wriggled out of his branchy bed,
examining himself. His tumble had
covered his garments with muck.
“Pah I” he condemned the mess, and
used his gloves to wipe his face, hair
and weapons. A look at the sky told
him it was morning — he had slept away
his fourth night from home.

Then he gazed downward. The val-
ley seemed to throb and steam. He
made out rich leafage and tall tree-
summits far below. One or two bright
birds flitted in the mists. Hok grim-
aced.

“Summer must sleep through the
cold, like a cave-bear,” he decided. “I
will go down, and look for Gragru’s
body.”

There were shoots and shrubs and
hummocks for him to catch with hands
and feet, or he would have gone sliding
again. The deeper he journeyed, the
warmer it became. Now and then he
hacked a big slash on a larger tree, to
keep his upward trail again. Those
trees, he observed, were often summer
trees, lusher and greener than any he
had ever seen.

“Is this the Ancient Land of safe and
easy life?” * he mused.

* Johann e* V. Jensen, Danish poet and scholar,
predicates his celebrated “Long Journey” saga on
the race-old myth of a warm Lost Country — the
memory among Ice-Age men of the tropical sur-
roundings among which the earliest human beings
developed, and which were banished by the
glaciers.— Ed.

HOK VISITS THE LAND OF LEGENDS

161

He threw off leggins and gloves and
the muddy lionskin cloak, tying these
into a bundle to carry. Further descent
into even more tropical temperature,
and he hung the superfluous garments
in a forked branch of a ferny thicket.
“I will get them when I return,” he de-
cided, and went on down, clad only In
clout and moccasins. Bow, quiver and
pouch he slung from his shoulders. The
deerhorn dagger rode in his leather
girdle. His big axe he kept ready in
his right hand, for what might chal-
lenge him.

The first challenger came, not up
from the valley, but down from the
misty air. Hok saw gray-green pinions,
four times wider than his own arm-
spread, and borne between them some-
thing like an evil dream of a stork. The
wings rustled as they flapped — he saw,
as they settled upon him, that they were
unfeathered membranes like a bat’s —
and two scaly rear talons slashed at
him.*

"Khaal” cried Hok, revolted, and set
himself for defense. He parried the
rush with his axe. The side, not the
edge, of the flint struck that monster’s
chest, blocking it off. Down darted the
long lean neck, and the ■ sharp-toothed
beak fastened in Hok’s hair. A mo-
ment later the clutching lizardy feet
closed on the axe-haft. Hok found
himself carried shakily aloft.

There was a struggle for the axe.
The thing could barely sustain Hok’s
weight clear of the ground, and it tried
to kill, not capture. A long tail bela-
bored him like a club, hideous hand-
like claws on the wing-elbows scratched
and scrabbled at his chest and throat.
Hok, dangling in midair, found himself
able to voice a savage laugh.

"Ahtil You think to eat Hok, you

* The race of pterodactyls, of which this speci-
men was a survivor, had wing-spreads as wide
as twenty-five feet, with beaks four feet long. — Ed.

nightmare? Others have found him a
tough morsel!” Quitting hold of the
axe with one hand, he whipped the dag-
ger from his belt. Thrusting upward,
he pierced the scaly throat to the bone.

'T'HE jaws let go his hair, and emitted
A a startled screech. Snaky-smelling
blood drenched Hok, and the two fell.
The wings, though out of control, par-
tially broke the tumble, and Hok had
the wit and strength to turn his enemy
under and fall upon it. They struck
the slope some paces lower than where
the fight began. Hok pinned the still
struggling nightmare with his foot, and
cleft it almost in two with his axe. Then
he stepped clear, nose wrinkled in dis-
gust.

“Khaal” he snorted again, mopping
away the ill-scented gore with handfuls
of fern. “I’d have doubly died if that
bird-snake had eaten me. Are there
others?”

His question was answered on the
instant. Dry flappings, shrill screams
— Hok sheltered in a thicket, and
watched a dozen more birdsnakes
swoop down to rend and devour their
slain brother. It was a sight to turn
the stomach of a Gnorrl. Hok slipped
away down slope.

Now he came to a gentler incline and
larger trees. He journeyed on without
mishap for the rest of the morning.
Hungry, he ate several strange fruits
from vine or tree at which he saw birds
pecking. Once, too, a strange thing
like, a tiny tailed man* scolded him in
a harsh high voice and flung down a big
husk-fibered nut. Hok dodged the
missile, split it and enjoyed both the
white flesh and the milky juice.

♦In Europe, where Hok lived, no remains of
native monkeys or apes more recent than Pliocene
times have been discovered; but, as the paleontolo-
gist Osborn reminds us, the tree-dwelling habit*
of such beasts might have made the remains diffi-
cult to keep whole. — Ed.

162

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

"Thanks, little brother I” he cried up at
the impish nut-thrower.

When noon was past, Hok had come
to where he could spy the floor of the
valley.

With difficulty he spied it, for it was
dusky dark. From it rose fumes, mist-
clouds, earthy odors. It was a swamp,
from which sprouted upward the tall-
est and biggest trees Hok had ever seen.
They grew thickly, interlaced with the
root-ends and butts of vines and creep-
ers, hummocked around with dank
clumps of fungi, rimmed with filthy
pools. Swanns of biting insects rose,
and Hok retreated, cursing.

“I see nothing of Gragru down
there,” he said. “I’ll go sidewise.”

Nicking a tree to mark the turnoff,
he travelled directly along the slope.
Nor had he far to go before he saw
Gragru.

Here was the place where mammoths
were entombed. Above, extending up
the valley’s slope, Was a tunnel through
trees and thickets, kept open by so
many falling, rolling masses of dead or
dying mammoth-meat. At the bottom
of the chute rose a stinking stack of re-
mains. Hok could not have counted
them — there must be thousands of des-
iccated and rotted carcasses, the bones
gray and the curling tusks white. On
top lay the freshest of these, Gragru
his quarry. And beside it was one that
had beaten Hok to the kill.

“First bird-snakes,” grumbled Hok.
“Now elephant-pigs.”

For the thing was bigger than an
elephant and grosser than a hog. Its
monstrous bulk, clad in scant-bristled
hide of slate gray, stooped above the
carcass. Its shallow, broad-snouted
skull bent down, and powerful fangs
tore the hairy hide from Gragru’s
flesh, exposing the tender meat. That
head lifted as Hok came into view, a
head larger than that of a hippopota-

mus. Two small hooded eyes, cold and
pale as a lizard’s, stared. The mouth
sucked and chewed bloody shreds, and
Hok saw down-protruding tusks, sharp
as daggers. Upon the undeveloped
brow, the swell of the muzzle, and the
tip of the snout were hornlike knobs —
three pairs of them.*

T^EXING Hok with that lizardlike
stare, the big brute set its ele-
phantine forefeet upon Gragru’s bulk
and hitched itself nearer. Its bloody,
fang-fringed jaws seemed to grin in an-
ticipation of different meat.

“Thing,” Hok addressed the mon-
ster, “you came unbidden to eat my
prey. You yourself shall be my meat,
to replace that which I killed.”

He lifted his bow, which was ready
strung, and reached over his shoulder
for an arrow. Just then the elephant-
pig moved toward him.

For all its unwieldy bulk, it came at
antelope speed, that great toothed maw
open to seize and rend. Hok swiftly
drew his long arrow to the head and
sent it full at the long protruding
tongue. The monster stopped dead,
emitting a shrill gargling squeal, and
lifted one horn-toed foot to paw at the
wound. Hok retired into a bushy
thicket, setting another arrow to string.

That thicket would have shielded him
from the charge of a buffalo or lion; but
the bulk of the present enemy was to
buffalo or lion as a fox to rabbits. It
charged among the brush, breaking off
stout stems like reeds. Hok, lighter,
had difficulty getting aside from its first
blind rush. He gained the open, and
* Dmoceras ingens , one of the largest and
ugliest of the Dinocerata, flourished in Eocene
times and may have lived later. It partook of
the natures of rhinoceros and swine, and its teeth
suggest it ate both animal and vegetable food.
Its many head-bumps may have been primitive
homs. Specimens have been found that were
twelve feet long and eight feet tall at the shoul-
ders. — Ed.

HOK VISITS THE LAND OF LEGENDS

163

so did the elephant-pig. It spied,
wheeled to charge again.

He discharged a second arrow, full
at one of those dead eyes. The six-
knobbed head twitched at that mo-
ment, and the shaft skewered a nostril
instead. Again a horrid yell of angry
pain. Hok sprang away from under
its very feet as it tried to run him down,
found himself heading into the swampy
bottom. There was a great cylindrical
mass among the trees, a trunk which
even this hideous monster could not
tear down. Hok ran to it, seeking to
climb the rough lappings of bark.

“You cannot climb quickly enough,”
said a voice from within the tree.
“Come inside, where I can look at you.”

CHAPTER IV

The Man Inside the Tree

TT IS «ften like that, even with a
A hunter as wise and sharp-eyed as
Hok. Not until the voice spoke to him,
in the language of men,* was he aware
that near him in the great trunk was a
gaping hole, big enough for him to slide
through, and full of blackness.

The tree itself was not a tree. For
trees are straight upward shoots of vege-
table growth — this seemed a high-built,
Close-packed spiral, as if someone had
coiled a rope, or a worm had made a
great casting. Between two woody
curves, one upon the other, showed the

•The old legend, mentioned in the book of
Genesis and elsewhere, that once “all men were
of one speech” may well be founded on fact —
witness similarities of certain key words among
races so far scattered as Welsh, Persian, and Man-
dan Indian. Even in the Stone Age there seems
to have been commerce and alliance, which means
that men must have understood each other.
Languages were simple then. Only with widely
divergent races, as the beastlike Gnorrls or Nean-
derthal men, would there be a definitely separate
tongue, hard to pronounce and harder to under-
stand because of differences in jaw structure,
brain, and mode of life. — Ed.

hole.

“Make haste,” bade the voice inside.
Hok saw that the elephant-pig, after
a momentary questing to spy and smell
him out, was ponderously wheeling
to charge. He waited for no third
invitation, but dived into the space,
head first. A struggle and a kick, and
he was inside, among comforting dim-
ness that bespoke solid protection all
around. A moment later the huge beast
struck outside, with a force that shook
every fiber of the strange stout growth
within which Hok had taken refuge.

“He cannot break throiigh to us,” as-
sured the voice, very near. “This vine
is stronger even than Rmanth, the
slayer.”

Hok made out a dark shape, slender
and quiet. “Vine?” he echoed. “But
this is a tree, a dead hollow tree.”

“The tree that once stood here is not
only dead, but gone,” he was quietly
informed. “If there were light, you
would see.”

Momentary silence, while Hok pon-
dered this statement. Outside the ele-
phant-pig, which seemed to be named
Rmanth, sniffed at the orifice like a
jackal at a rat-burrow.

“You don’t sound like a mocker,”
was Hok’s final judgment aloud. “And
it is true that this is a strange growth
around us. As for light, why not build
a fire?”

“Fire?” repeated the other uncer-
tainly. “What is that?”

Hok could not but chuckle. “You do
not know? Fire lights and warms you.”
“For warmth, it is never cold here.
And for light — I do not like too much.”
“There is need of light in this dark-
ness,” decided Hok weightily. “If you
truly do not know fire, I can show bet-
ter than I can tell.”

He groped with his hands on the floor
of the cavern into which he had come.
It seemed earthy, with nuch rubbish.

164

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

He found some bits of punky wood,
then larger pieces, and cleared a hearth-
space. From his pouch he brought
needful things — a flat chip of pine, one
edge notched; a straight, pointed stick
of hard wood; a tuft of dry moss.

“Thus,” lectured Hok, “is fire made.”

Working in the dark, he twirled the
stick between his palms. Its point, in
the notch of the chip, rubbed and
heated. Within moments Hok smelled
scorching, then smoke. A faint glow
peeped through the gloom. Lifting away
the chip, Hok held his moss-tinder to
the little coal of glowing wood-meal.
The rising blaze he fed with splinters,
then larger pieces. The fire rose.
“There I” cried Hok, and had time and
illumination to look up.

H IS „ first .glance showed him the
refuge — a circular cavity, twice
a man’s height in diameter, and walled
snugly with those close-packed woody
spirals. High above the space ex-

tended, with what looked like a gleam-
ing white star at some distant apex.
The floor was of well-trampled loam
and mold, littered with ancient wood
chips. His second glance showed him
his companion.

Here was a body slimmer and shorter
than the average man of the Flint
People. The shoulders sloped, the

muscles were stringy rather than swell-
ing, there were no hips or calves.
Around the slender waist was a clout
rudely woven of plant 'fiber, its girdle
supporting a queerly made little axe
and what seemed to be a knife. The
feet, outthrust toward Hok, looked like
hands — the great toe was set well back,
and plainly could take independent
grasp. On the chest — quite deep in
proportion to the slimness — and on the
outer arms and legs grew long, sparse
hair of red-brown color. Hok could
not see the face, for the man crouched

and buried his head in his long arms.

“Don’t,” came his muffled plea.
“Don’t. . .

“It will not hurt,” Hok replied, puz-
zled.

“I cannot look, it burns my eyes.
Once the forest was eaten by such stuff,
that struck down from heaven — ”

“Lightning,” guessed Hok. “Oh, yes,
fire can be terrible when big. But we
keep it small, feeding it only sparingly.
Then it is good. See, I do not fear.
I promise it will not hurt you.”

His tone reassured the man, who
finally looked up, albeit apprehensively.
Hok studied his face.

Long loose lips, a nose both small and
flattish, and no chin at all beneath a
scraggle of brown beard. From the
wide mouth protruded teeth — Hok saw
businesslike canines above and below,
capable of inflicting a terrible bite. This
much was plainly of animal fashion,
unpleasantly Gnorrlish. But neither
the fangs nor the shallow jaw could de-
tract from the manifest intelligence of
the upper face.

For here were large dark eyes, set
very well under smooth brows. The
forehead, though not high, was fairly
broad and smooth, and the cranium
looked as if it might house intelligence
and good temper.*

“Don’t be afraid,” persisted Hok.
“You were friendly enough to call me
into this shelter. I am grateful, and I
will show it.”

O MANTHS, the monster outside,
sniffed and scraped at the en-
trance. He seemed baffled. Hok
leaned against the wall. “What is your
name?” he asked.

The other peered timidly. Hok saw
the size and brilliance of those eyes, and
guessed that this man could see, at
least somewhat in the dark. “Soko,”
came the reply. “And you?”

HOK VISITS THE LAND OF LEGENDS

165

“Hok the Mighty.” That was spoken
with honest pride. “I came here from
snowy country up above. I had
wounded ‘a mammoth, and followed
him down here.”

“Mammoths always come here,”
Soko told him. “Rmanth and his
people before him — for he is the last of
a mighty race — ate their flesh and flour-
ished. If we dare descend the trees,
Rmanth kills and eats us, too. In the
high branches — the Stymphs!”
“Stymphs?” echoed Hok. “What
are those?”

Soko had his turn at being sur-
prised at such ignorance. “They fly
like birds, but are bigger and hungrier
- — -with teeth in their long jaws — man
cannot prevail against them — ”

“Oh, the bird-snakes! One attacked
me as I came down. I killed it, and de-
scended before its friends came.”

“You were climbing downward,”
Soko reminded. “There was cover be-
low. But if you leave the cover to
climb upward, you will be slain in the
open, by many Stymphs. Not even
Rmanth ventures above the thickets.”
“As to your elephant-pig, Rmanth,”
continued Hok, “he has tasted my ar-
rows.”

That was another new word for Soko,
and Hok passed his bow and quiver
across for examination. “One shaft
I feathered in his tongue,” he con-
tined, “and another in his nostril.”
“But were forced to take shelter
here. Meanwhile, those wounds will
make him the thirstier for your blood.
He will never forget your appearance
or smell. If you venture out, he will
follow you to the finish. Between him
and the Stymphs above, what chance
have you?”

“What chance have I?” repeated
Hok, his voice ringing. “Chance for
combat! For adventure! For Vic-
tory!” He laughed for joy, anticipat-

ing these things. “I’m glad I came—
these dangers are worth traveling far
to meet . . . but tell me of another
wonder. This tree, which is not a tree,
but shelters us in its heart — ”

“Oh, simple enough,” rejoined Soko.
He was beginning to enjoy the com-
radeship by the glowing fire. Sitting
opposite Hok, slender hands clasped
around his knobby knees, he smiled.
“A true tree grew here once, tall and
strong. At its root sprang up a vine,
which coiled tightly around like a
snake. In time that vine grew to the
very top. 'Its hugging coils, and its sap-
drinking suckers, slew the tree, which
rotted and died in the grip. But the
vine held the shape to which it had
grown, and when we tree-folk dug out
the rotten wood, little by little, it made
a safe tube by which we could descend
to the valley’s floor.”*

“That must have taken much labor,”
observed Hok.

“And much time. My father’s father
barely remembered when it Was begun,
that digging.”

“You speak as if you live up above
here,” said Hok.

“We do,” Soko told him. “Come,
kill the fire lest it burn the forest, and
I will take you to the home of my
people.”

He rose and began climbing upward.

CHAPTER V

The World in the Branches

TTOK quickly stamped out the fire.
A A Its dying light showed him a sort
of rough ladder — pegs and stubs of
hard wood, wedged into the spaces be-
tween the coils of that amazing vine.
Soko was swarming well a bove ground

* Several types of big tropical vine, both in
Africa and South America, create this curious
growth-pattern by killing the trees they climb
and remaining erect in the same place. — Ed.

166

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

level already. Slinging his weapons to
girdle and shoulder-thongs, Hok fol-
lowed.

Hok had always been a bold and
active climber, able to outdistance any
of his tribe-fellows, in trees or up cliffs.
But Soko kept ahead of him, like a
squirrel ahead of a bear. The tree-man
fairly scampered up the ladder-way.

“This is another way in which
Soko’s people are different from the
Gnorrls,” * muttered Hok.

The climbing-sticks had been meant
for bodies of Soko’s modest weight,
and once or twice they creaked danger-
ously beneath the heavier Hok. He
obviated the danger of a fall by keep-
ing each hand and foot on a different
hold, dividing the strain four ways.
Meanwhile, the light above grew
stronger, waxing and waning as Soko’s
nimble body cut this way and that
across its beam. Finally, noise and
bustle, and a new voice:

“Soko! You went down to see what
was happening with Rmanth. What — ”
“A man,” Soko answered. “A strange
man, like none you ever saw.”

Hok took that as a compliment. He
was considered something of a unique
specimen, even among his own kind.

“He is master of the Hot Hunger,”
Soko went on, and Hok guessed that he
meant fire. “He has killed one Stymph,
he says, and has hurt Rmanth.”

A chatter of several agitated voices
above. Then, “Will he kill us?”

“I think not,” said Soko, and drew
himself through some sort of gap above.
“Come on out, Hok,” he called back.
“My friends are eager to see you.”

Hok came to the opening in turn.
It was narrow for his big body, and he
had difficulty in wriggling through.
Standing on some crossed and inter-
woven boughs, he looked at Soko’s

* The Neanderthal men were of massive, dumsy
build — obviously poor climbers. — Ed.

people.

All the way up, he had thought of
Soko as fragile and small; now he real-
ized, as often before, that fragility and
smallness is but comparative. Soko,
who was a head shorter than himself
and slim in proportion, would be con-
sidered sturdy and tall among the tree-
folk — almost a giant. He was the big-
gest of all who were present. Hok
smiled to himself. While he had been
pegging Soko as a timid lurker in a
hollow, these dwellers of the branches
must have thrilled to the courage of
their strong brother, venturing so close
to the mucky domain of the ravenous
Rmanth.

As Hok came fully into view, the
gathering — there may have been twenty
or thirty of Soko’s kind, men, women
and children — fell back on all sides
with little gasps and squeaks of fearful
amazement. With difficulty the chief
of the Flint People refrained from most
unmannerly laughter. If Soko was a
strapping champion among them, Hok
must seem a vast horror, strangely
shaped, colored and equipped. He
smiled his kindliest, and sat down
among the woven branches.

“Soko speaks truth,” he announced.
“I have no desire to fight or kill anyone
who comes in peace.”

r jpHEY still stood off from him, bal-

ancing among the leafage. He was
aware that they moved so swiftly and
surely because they got a grip on the
branches with their feet. He was able,
also, to make a quick, interested study
of the world they lived in.

Though Soko had led him upward in
a climb of more than twenty times a
man’s height, the upper hole in the vine
spiral was by no means the top of the
forest. Leafage shut away the sky
above, the swampy ground below. Here,
in the middle branches of the close-set

HOK VISITS THE LAND OF LEGENDS

167

mighty trees, appeared something of a
lofty floor — the boughs and connecting
vines, naturally woven and matted to-
gether into a vast bridge of platform,
swaying but strong. Layers of leaf-
mold, mixed with blown dust, moss and
the rotted meal of dead wood, over-
spread parts of this fabric. The aerial
earthiness bore patches of grass and
weeds, bright-flowering plants, as richly
as though it were based upon the rock
instead of the winds. Birds picked at
seeds. Hok heard the hum of bees
around trumpet-shaped blooms. It was
a great wonder.* 1

“I wondered how you tree-men could
possibly live off the ground,” he said,
with honest admiration. “Now I won-
der how you can live anywhere else but
here.” A deep-chested sigh. “Of such
fair places our old men tell us, in the
legends of the Ancient Land.”

That friendly speech brought the
tree-dwellers closer to this big stranger.
A half-grown lad was boldest, coming
straight to Hok and fingering his leather
moccasins. Hok’s first thought was
how swiftly young Ptao, at home by
the frozen river, could thrash and con-
quer such a youth — his second was a
hope that Ptao would be forebearing
and gentle to so harmless a specimen.
The others gathered around reassured.
They began asking questions. It was
strange to all that a human being could
kill large beasts for food and fur, and
the men were particularly fascinated
by Hok’s flint weapons.

“We have our own stories of old
times, when your fathers made stone
things,” volunteered Soko. “Now we
satisfy ourselves with what bones we
can raid from that great pile of mam-
moths, when Rmanth is not there gorg-
ing himself.” He produced his own

♦This description is no fancy. The author
himself, and many others, have seen such sky-
gardens among the branches of modem rain-
forests in West Africa. — Ed.

dagger, smaller than Hok’s reindeer-
horn weapon, but well worked from a
bone fragment. “After all, we need not
fight monsters, like you.”

“If you did fight like me, all to-
gether, and with wisdom and courage,
Rmanth would not have you treed,”
said Hok bluntly. “Perhaps I can help
you with him. But first, tell me more
of yourselves. You think it strange
that I wear skins. What are these
weavings you wear?”

“The forest taught us,” said Soko
sententiously. “As the branches weave
and grow together, so we cross and
twine little tough strings and threads
drawn from leaves and grasses. They
give us covering, and places to carry
possessions. Is it so marvelous? Birds
do as much with their nests.”

“'NJ'ESTS ?” repeated Hok. “And how
do you people nest?”

“Like the birds — in woven beds of
branches, lined with soft leaves and
fiber. A roof overhead, of course, to
shed the rain.” Soko pointed to a lit-
tle cluster of such shelters, not far away
in an adjoining tree.*

“You do nothing but sleep and play?”
“We gather fruits and nuts,” spoke
up another of the tree-men. “That
takes time and work, for a man who
has gathered much must feed his friends
who may have gathered little.”

“It is so with my people, when one
hunter kills much meat and others re-
turn empty-handed,” nodded Hok.
“What else, then?”

“A great labor is the mending of this
floor,” replied Soko, patting with his
foot the woven platform. “Branches
rot and break. We look for such places,
through which our children might fall
at play, and weave in new strong pieces,
or tie and lace across with stout vines.”

* The great apes make such nests, roofs and
all.— Ed.

168

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

Once again Hok glanced upward.
“And what la there?”

A shudder all around. “Stymphs,”
muttered Soko, in a soft voice, as if
he feared to summon a flock of the bird-
snakes.

‘Ugly thing,” said Hok. “I may
do something about them, too. But I
am hungry just now — ”

Before he could finish, the whole
community dashed away like so many
squirrels through the boughs, to bring
back fistfuls of nuts, pawpaws and
grapes. Hok accepted all he could pos-
sibly eat, and thanked his new friends
heartily.

“I did not mean that you must feed
me,” he told them. “You should wait
for me to finish my talk. But since you
bring these fruits, I will make my meal
of them. You may take my provision.”
From his pouch he rummaged the re-
mainder of his dried meat. It was one
more new thing to the tree people, who
nibbled and discussed and argued over
it. Flesh they had occasionally — small
climbers, fledgling birds, even insects —
but nothing of larger game, and both
cooking and drying of food was beyond
their understanding. Hok chuckled
over their naivete.

“A promise I” he cried. “I’ll give you
Rmanth himself for a feast, and I shall
roast him on a fire, that which you call
the Hot Hunger. But let Soko sit here
by me. I want to hear of how you came
to this place to live.”

Soko perched on a tangle of vines.
“Who can tell that? It was so long
ago. Cold weather drove us from the
upper world,” and he pointed north-
ward. “Those who stayed behind were
slain by it. Our old men tell tales and
sing songs of how the remnants of the
fleeing tribe blundered in here and gave
themselves up as trapped.”

“Why did the ice not follow you in?”
asked Hok.

“Ask that of the gods, who drove ft
to right and left of our valley. In any
case, we were sheltered here, though
there were many fierce creatures. But
the cold was fiercer — we could not face
it — and here we stay.”*

“Treed by Rmanth and harried by
those Stymph bird-snakes,” summed up
Hok. “You are happy, but you could
make yourselves much happier by some
good planning and fighting. Who is
your chief?”

“I am their chief,” growled someone
behind him, “and you had better ex-
plain — quickly — why you seek to make
my people dissatisfied.”

CHAPTER VI
A Chief Passes Sentence

'"J''HERE was a sudden gasping and
A cowering among all the tree-folk,
even as concerned the relatively sturdy
Soko. Hok turned toward the speaker,
expecting to come face to face with a
fearsome challenger.

Around the spiral vine-column a little
grizzled form was making its way. This
tree-man was old and ill-favored, with
almost pure white whiskers on his chin-
less jaw. He wheezed and snorted, as
though the exertion were too much for
him. Perhaps this was due to his
weight, for he was the fattest Hok had
yet seen among those dwellers of the
trees. His belly protruded like a wal-
let, his jowls hung like dewlaps. But
there was nothing old or infirm about

♦ The Piltdown Race seems to have flourished
in the Third Interglacial Epoch, a warm age
when even northern Europe was as pleasant and
temperate as Italy. Such African-Asiatic fauna
as hippopotami and tigers flourished side by side
with these forerunners of human beings. When
the Fourth Glaciation brought ice and snow to
cover Europe, the robust Neanderthals and the
later, greater true men of Hok’s race could survive
and adapt themselves; but a less rugged prehuman
type like the Piltdown must flee or perish. — Ed.

HOK VISITS THE LAND OF LEGENDS

169

the power in his big, close-set brilliant
eyes.

Gaining the side o{ the nearest tree-
man to him, this oldster put out a con-
fident hand and snatched away a size-
able slice of the dried meat Hok had
distributed. Though the victim of this
plunder was an active young man, he
did not resist or even question, but drew
diffidently away. The old man took a
bite — his teeth, too, were young-seem-
ing and rather larger and sharper than
ordinary — and grunted approval. Then
his eyes fastened Hok’s, in a calculated
stare of hostility.

But Hok had met the gaze of the
world’s fiercest beasts and men, and
his were not the first eyes to falter.
The old tree-chief finally glanced away.
Hok smiled in good-humored contempt.

“Well?” challenged the oldster at
last. “Do you know how to act before
your betters?”

Hok was puzzled. The simple truth
was that Hok had never recognized any-
one as his better from his youth up-
wards.

Years before, when a big boy not yet
fully mature, the slaying of his father
by Gnorrls had made him chief of his
clan. His young manhood had barely
come to him before he had driven those
same beastly Gnorrls from their rich
hunting-empire of meadows and woods,
and founded in their stead an alliance
of several tribes, with himself as head
chief. The mighty nation of Tlanis was
sunken under the sea because of him.
The Fishers in their seaside pile-villages
had changed their worship from water-
god to sun-god out of sadly learned re-
spect for Hok. If ever he had been
subordinate, even only the second great-
est individual in any gathering, he had
had plenty of time to forget it.

Just now he spat idly, through a gap
in the woven branches.

“Show me my betters,” he requested

with an air of patience. “I know none,
on two legs or four.”

“I am Kroll” squeaked the other,
and smote his gray-tufted chest with a
fat fist. "Be afraid, you hulking yel-
low-haired stranger 1”

“Men of the trees,” Hok addressed
those who listened, “is it your custom
to keep fools to make game for you?
This man has white hair, he should be
quiet and dignified. He is a bad ex-
ample to the young.”

It was plainly blasphemy. Soko and
the others drew further away from Hok,
as though they feared to be involved in
some terrible fate about to overwhelm
him. The chief who called himself
Krol fumbled in his girdle of twisted
fiber, and drew forth an axe of mam-
moth ivory set in a hard-wood handle.
Whirling it around his head, he cast it
at Hok.

pi OK lifted a big knowing hand, with
such assurance that the movement
seemed languid. The axe drove straight
at his face, but he picked it out of the
air as a frog’s tongue picks a flying in-
sect. Without pausing he whirled it in
his own turn and sent it sailing back.
It struck with a sharp chock, deep into
a big branch just above Krol’s head.

“Try again,” bade Hok, as though he
were instructing a child in how to throw
axes.

Krol’s big fangs gnashed, and foam
sprank out in flecks upon his lips and
beard. He waved his fists at his people.

“On him! ” he screamed. “Seize him,
beat him, bind fast his arms!”

Hok rose from where he sat, bracing
himself erect. He looked with solem-
nity upon the half-dozen or so biggest
men who moved to obey.

“Come at me, and you will think
Rmanth himself has climbed up among
you,” he warned. “I do not like to be
handled.”

170

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

Krol yelped a further order, backing
it by a threat. The men rushed unwill-
ingly.

Hok laughed, like an athlete playing
with children. Indeed, the tree-men
were childlike in comparison with him.
He pushed the first two in the face with
his palms, upsetting them and almost
dropping them through the branchy
fabric. A third attacker he caught and
lifted overhead, wedging him in a fork
of the boughs. The others retreated
fearfully before such effortless strength.
Hok laughed again, watching.

But he should have watched Krol as
well. The plump old despot had stolen
close unobserved. In one hand he
clutched a big fiber husked nut, of the
milky kind Hok had enjoyed earlier in
the day. A swinging buffet on the
skull, and Hok staggered, partially
stunned. At once the tree-men rushed
back, and before Hok could clear his
brain and fight them off, he was
swamped. They looped his wrists,
ankles and body with quickly-plucked
vine tendrils, tough and limber as
leather straps.

Krol found time to take some fruit
from a child, and husk it with his teeth.
“Now, stranger,” he sniggered, “you
will learn that I am chief here.”

Hok had recovered from that stroke.
He did not waste strength or dignity by
striving against his stout bonds.

“A chief who plays tricks and lets
other men do the fighting,” he replied.
“A chief who strikes his enemies foully,
from behind.”

Krol had repossessed his ivory axe.
He lifted it angrily, as though to smite
it into Hok’s skull. But then he low-
ered it, and grinned nastily.

“I heard you blustering when I came
up,” he said. “Something about fight-
ing. What do you think to fight?”

“I spoke of Rmanth, the elephant-
pig,” replied Hok. “Yes, and the

Stymphs. Your people fear them. I
do not.”

“Mmmml ” Kroll glanced downward,
then up. “They are only little pests to
mighty warriors like you, huh? You
do not fear them? Hok — that it your
name, I think you said — I will do you
a favor. You shall have closer ac-
quaintanceship with the Stymphs.”

1V/TENTION of the dread bird-snakes
made the tree-folk shiver, and
Krol sneered at them with a row of
grinning fangs.

“You cowards!” he scolded. “You
disgrace me before this boastful
stranger. Yet you know that Stymphs
must eat, if they are to live and let us
alone. Hoist this prey up to them.”

“Bound and helpless?” demanded
Hok. “That is a part of your own
cowardice, Krol. You shall howl for
it.”

“But you shall howl first, and loud-
est," promised Krol. “You biggest
men, come and carry him up. Yes,
high!”

That last was to quicken the unwill-
ing limbs of his fellows, who seemed
to like Hok and not to like the prospect
of mounting into the upper branches.

Thus driven to obedience, four of the
biggest men nimbly rove more vines
around the captive, fashioning a sort of
hammock to hold him and his weapons.
Soko, stooping to tie a knot, gazed in-
tently into Hok’s face. One of Soko’s
big bright eyes closed for a moment —
the ancient and universal wink of al-
liance, warning, and promise.

The four scrambled up and up, bear-
ing Hok among them. Now the sky
came into view, dullish and damp but
warm. Apparently the valley was al-
ways wreathed, at least partially, in
light mists. Into a tall treetop the big
captive was hoisted, and made fast
there like a dangling cocoon. Krol

HOK VISITS THE LAND OF LEGENDS

171

panted fatly as he clambered alongside.
The others departed at his nod. Krol,
passing Hok, jostled the big bound
wrists. Hok felt something pressed
against his palm, and closed his fingers
upon it.

The hilt of Soko’s bone knife 1 With
difficulty he fought back a smile of
triumph. . . .

Then he was alone in the treetop with
Krol.

“Look up, you scoffer/ bade Krol.
“In the mists — do you see anything?”

“Very dimly, I make out flying
shapes,” replied Hok quietly. “Two-
three — no, many.”

“They can see you, and plainly,”
Krol informed him. “Like my people,
the Stymphs have ability to see far on
dull days, or dark holes, or even at
night. They have cunning sense of
smell, too. Probably they scent some
prey close at hand now, and wonder if
I have hung something up for them.”

“You hang food for the Stymphs?”
demanded Hok.

“Yes, such men as displease me —
don’t stare and wonder. I am chief of
my tribe. I must keep an alliance with
other powers.”

Krol squinted upward, where the
Stymphs hovered in the mist-wreaths.
Opening his wide mouth, he emitted a
piercing cry, half howl and half whistle.
The bird-snakes began to flap as if in
response.

“They know my voice, they will
come,” announced Krol. With the evil-
lest of grins, he swung down to the
safety of the foliage below.

No sooner was he gone than Hok
began to ply that bone knife Soko had
smuggled to him. It was difficult work,
but he pressed the well-sharpened edge
strongly against the vine loops around
his wrist. They separated partially,
enough to allow him to strain and snap
them. Even as the boldest Stymph

lowered clear of the mists and began to
angle downward, Hok won his arms
free. A few mighty hacks, and he
cleared away the rest of his hammocky
bonds.

The tree-folk had bound his un-
familiar weapons in with him. Draw-
ing himself astride of a big horizontal
branch, Hok strung the big bow and
tweaked an arrow out of his quiver.

“I have a feeling,” he said aloud to
this strange land at large, “that I was
sent here— by gods or spirits or by
chance — to face and destroy these
Stymphs.”*

CHAPTER VII
The Stymphs

gO CONFIDENT was Hok of his
ability to deal with the situation
that he actually waited, arrow on string,
for a closer mark. After all, he had
killed one such bird-snake with a single
quick thrust of his dagger. Why
should he fear many, when he had ar-
rows, an axe, and two knives? A big
Stymph tilted in the mist and slid down
as if it were an otter on a mud-bank.
Its long triangular head, like the night-
mare of a stork, drooped low on the
snaky neck. Its jag-toothed bill
opened.

Hok let it come so close that his flar-
ing nostrils caught the reptilian odor;
then, drawing his shaft to its barbed
head of sandstone, he loosed full at the
scaly breast. Hok’s bow was the
strongest among all men of his time,

* Readers who know the mythology of ancient
Greece will already have seen some connection be*
tween the surviving pterodactyls called Stymphs
and the Stymphalides, described as “great birds”
who ate men. The ancient Greeks said that the
Stymphalides had plumage of metal, which sounds
very much like reptilian scaliness. Hercules, the
Grecian memory of Hok, is credited with destroy-
ing these monsters as one of bis twelve heaven-
assigned labors. — Ed.

172

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

and a close-delivered arrow from it
struck with all the impact of a war-club.
The flint point tore through the body,
flesh, scales and bone, and protruded
behind. The swoop of the Stymph was
arrested as though it had blundered
against a rock in mid-air. It whirled
head over lizard tail, then fell flooping
and screeching toward the great mass
of foliage below.

“Ahail” Hok voiced his war-shout,
and thundered mocking laughter at the
other Stymphs. ‘‘Thus Hok serves
those who face him. Send me another
of your champions!”

Several of the abominations had
flown a little way after their falling
friend. But, before they could get their
cannibal beaks into the stricken body,
it had lost itself among the branches,
and they came up again to center on the
more exposed meat in the treetop. Two
advanced at once, and from widely
separate angles.

Hok had notched another arrow, and
sped it into the chest of one. Before
he could seize a third shaft, the other
Stymph was upon him. Its talons made
a clutch, scraping long furrows in his
shoulder. He cursed it, and struck a
mighty whipping blow with his bow-
stave that staggered it in mid-flight.
Clutching the supporting branch with
his legs, he tore his axe from its lash-
ing at his girdle, and got it up just in
time to meet the recovering drive of the
brute. Badly gashed across the nar-
row, evil face, the Stymph’ reeled
downward, trying in vain to get con-
trol of its wings and rise again.

More Stymphs circled this third vic-
tim of Hok, and tore several bloody
mouthfuls from it. A loud clamor
rose over Hok’s head — the smell of
gore was maddening the flock. Slip-
ping his right hand through the thong
on his axe handle, he looked up.

The sky was filling with Stymphs.

Though never a man to recognize dan-
ger with much respect, Hok was forced
to recognize it now. Where he had
thought to meet a dozen or score of
the monsters, here they were mustered
in numbers like a flock of swallows —
his system of counting, based on tens
and tens of tens, would not permit
him to be sure of their strength, even
if he had time.

For they had dropped all over him,
all of them at once.

A TOOTHY jaw closed on his left
elbow. Before it could bite to the
bone, he whipped his axe across and
smashed the shallow skull with the
flat of the blade. Back-handing, he
brought the axe round to smite and
knock down another attacker. Axe
and bow-stave swept right and left, and
every blow found and felled a Stymph.
The stricken ones were attacked and
rended by their ravenous fellows,
which made a hurly-burly of confusion
and perhaps saved Hok from instant
annihilation by the pack. As it was,
he knew that the Stymphs were far too
many for him.

The end of this furious struggle
in the open top of the jungle came with
an abrupt climax that Hok never
liked to remember afterward. He had
ducked low on his limb to avoid the
sweeping rush of a big Stymph, and
for a moment loosened the straddle-
clutch of his legs. At the same moment
another of the creatures dropped
heavily upon his shoulders, sinking its
claws into his flesh. Its weight dis-
lodged him. Hok lost all holds, and
fell hurtling into the leafy depths below.

His right hand quitted its hold on the
big axe, which remained fast to his
wrist by the looped thong. Reaching
up and back as he fell, he seized the
Stymph by its snaky throat and with a
single powerful jerk freed it from its

HOK VISITS THE LAND OF LEGENDS

173

grasp upon his ribs and brought it
under him. Its striving wings were
slowing the fall somewhat, though it
could not rise with his weight. A mo-
ment afterward, the two of them
crashed into the mass of twigs and
leaves, hit an outhrust bough heavily.

The Stymph, underneath, took most
of that shock. Its ribs must have been
shattered. At the instant of impact,
Hok had presence of mind to quit his
grip upon its neck, and managed to
fling his arm around the branch. He
clung there, feet kicking in space,
while the Stymph fell shrieking into
the middle branches.

Again he was momentarily safe. He
looked up. The Stymphs, where they
were visible through sprays of green-
ery, were questing and circling to find
him, like fish-hawks above the water’s
surface.

“Ahail Here I am, you bird-
snakes!” he roared his challenge, and
climbed along the branch to a broader
fork, where he could stand erect with-
out holding on. And here he found
shelter, even from those ravenous
beaks and claws.

A great parasitic growth, allied to
giant dodder or perhaps mistletoe,
made a great golden-leafed mat above
him, circular in form and wider across
than the height of two tall men. It
could be seen through, but its tough
tendrils and shoots could hold back
heavier attacks than the Stymph swarm
might manage.

“Come on and fight!” he taunted
again. “I have killed many of you,
and still I live! Ahai, I am Hok the
Mighty, whose sport it is to kill
Stymphs and worse things than
Stymphs!”

r T''HE flattened, darkling brains of the
Stymphs understood the tone, if not
the words of that defiance. They be-

gan to drop down on winnowing scaly
wings, peering and questing for him.
“Here, just below!” he cried to guide
them. Then he slung his bow behind
him, and poised his axe, spitting be-
tween hand and haft for a better grip.

They settled quickly toward him,
wriggling and forcing their way
through the upper layers of small twigs.
He laughed once again, and one of the
Stymphs spied him through the tangled
matting. It alighted, clutching the
strands with its talons, and with a single
lancing stroke of its tight-shut beak
drove through a weak spot in the
shield. Hok stared into its great cold
eyes, and shifted his position to avoid
its snap. s

“Meet Hok, meet death,” he said to
it, and chopped off that ugly head with
his axe. The body flopped and wrig-
gled beyond his jumble of defending
vegetation, and three of the other
Stymphs came down all together to
feast upon it.

That was what Hok wanted. “So
many guests come to dine with Hok?”
he jibed. “Then the host must pro-
vide more meat.”

He laid his longest arrow across the
bow-stave. For a moment the three
fluttering bird-snakes huddled close to-
gether above the prey, almost within
touch of him. Setting the head of his
arrow to an opening among the whorls
and tangles, he loosed it at just the
right moment.

A triple shrillness of pained scream-
ing beat up, and Hok was spattered
with rank-smelling blood. Skewered
together like bits of venison on a toast-
ing-stick, the three Stymphs floun-
dered, somersaulted and fell, still held
in an agony of conjunction by Hok’s
arrow. For the first time, unhurt
Stymphs drew back as in fear. Hok
made bold to show himself, climbing up
on top of his protecting mat.

“Do you go?” he demanded. “Am
I as unappetizing as all that?”

They came yet again, and he dodged
nimbly back into safety. More ar
rows — he had a dozen left. These he
produced, thrusting them through
broad leaves around him so as to be
more quickly seized and sped. Then,
as the Stymphs blundered heavily
against his shield of natural wicker-
work, he began to kill them.

Close-packed as they were, and
within touch of him, he could not miss.
By twos and threes his arrows fetched
them down. Even the small reptile-
minds of the flying monsters could not

but register danger. Survivors began
to flop upward, struggle into the open
air above the branches, retreat into the
mist. Hok hurled imprecations and
insults after them, and once more
mounted the mat to kill wounded
wretches with his axe, and to drag his
arrows from the mass of bodies.

HOK VISITS THE LAND Or LEGENDS

aka crawled out
' sharpened stick

help, down here in the mists beyond the
reach of his rays. My children shall
never forget this kindness.”*

From below came an awkward
scrambling, and Krol, the chief of the
tree-folk, mounted upward into view.

“Greetings,” Hok chuckled at him.
“See what sport I have made with
your friends, the bird-snakes.”

Krol might have feared the huge,
blood-smeared chief of the Flint People,
had he not been so concerned with the
retreat of the Stymphs overhead.

“They will go,” he chattered. “They
will never come back, because they fear
you. If I had known — ”

* The surviving myth tells how Hercules (Hok.)
was sheltered from the Stymphalides by the buck-
j ler of Pallas Athene, so that he was able to win
victory at leisure. — Ed.

176

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

“If you had known, you would not
have hung me up for them to eat,” Hok
finished for him. “As it is, I have
driven off your ugly allies, by fear of
which you ruled your people. That fear
will be gone hereafter. So, I think, will
you.”

Hok swung down to a branch
above Krol and feinted a brain-dash-
ing blow with his axe. Then he
laughed as the tree-chief let go all
holds, dropping six times his own
length through emptiness. He caught
a branch below.

“You and I are enemies 1” he snarled
upward. “Though you have beaten
my Stymphs, there remain other
things — even Rmanths! I shall see
you dead, and your body rended by the
tusks of Rmanth, Hok the Meddler!”

And then, though Hok began climb-
ing swiftly downward, old Krol was
swifter and surer. They both descended
through thickening layers of foliage, to
the woven living-place of the tree
people.

CHAPTER V!ll

The Dethroning of Krol

T)Y the time the slower-climbing
^ Hok had come down to that
mighty hammocklike footing, Krol had
had precious minutes to gather his fol-
lowers and howl orders and accusa-
tions into their ears.

“Ah, here he comes to mock us, the
overgrown invader!” Krol yelled, and
shook a furious finger toward the ap-
proaching Hok. “He has slain the
Stymphs, who protected us!”

“I have slain the Stymphs, who
feasted on any tree-man daring to
climb as high as the open air above the
forest,” rejoined Hok, with a lofty man-
ner as of one setting Krai’s statement
right. “I have helped you, not in-

jured you.”

Krol glared with a fury that seemed
to hurl a rain of sparks upon Hok.
“You biggest men,” he addressed the
other tree-folk out of the side of his
broad, loose mouth, “seize him and bind
him a second time.”

Hok set his shoulder-blades to the
main stem of a tree. He looked at the
tree-men. They seemed a trifle em-
barrassed, like boys stealing from a lar-
der. Soko, tht biggest among them,
was plainly the most uneasy as well.
Hok decided to profit by their inde-
cision.

“You caught me once because I was
playful among you,” he said. “Hok
never makes the same mistake twice.
Standing thus, I cannot be knocked
down from behind. Meanwhile,” and
he quickly strung his bow, notching
an arrow, “I shall not only strike my
attackers, I shall strike them dead.”

“Obey me!” blustered Krol, and one
of the men lifted a heavy milk-nut to
throw. Hok shot the missle neatly out
of the hand that held it.

“No throwing,” he warned. “Charge
me if you will, but make it a fight at
close quarters. Those who survive will
have a fine tale to tell forever.” He
glanced sideways, to a gap in the mat-
ting. “But the first man to come
within my reach I shall cast down
there. Krol, is your other ally,
Rmanths, hungry?”

The half-formed attack stood still,
despite Krol’s now hysterical com-
mands to rush Hok. When the old
tree-chief had paused, panting for
breath, Hok addressed the gathering
once again:

“You cannot hope to fight me, you
slender ones. The Stymphs, who have
held you frightened for so long, fell
dead before me like flies in the frost.
Of us two — Hok or Krol — who is
greatest?”

HOK VISITS THE LAND OF LEGENDS

177

“Hok is greatest,” announced Soko
suddenly.

It was plain that none had dared sug-
gest rebellion against Krol since the
beginning of time. Krol was as taken
aback as other hearers. Soko turned
toward Krol, and the old chief actu-
ally shrank back.

“He admits killing the Stymphs, he
admits itl” jabbered Krol, flapping a
nervous paw at Hok. “If they are
gone, how shall strangers be kept out
of this land of ours?”

ILTOK guessed that this was an
ancient and accepted argument
The tree-folk naturally feared invasion,
must have been taught to think of the
Stymphs as their guardians against
such a danger. He snorted with scorn-
ful amusement.

“The old liar speaks of ‘this land of
yours,’ ” he repeated. “How is it your
land, men of the trees, when you can
neither tread its soil nor look into its
sky — when bird-snakes prey on you
above, and an elephant-pig prowls be-
low, so that you must dwell forever in
this middle-part like tree frogs?” He
paused, and judged that his question
had struck pretty close to where those
folk did their thinking. “I have been
your benefactor,” he summed up. “The
open air is now yours, for Krol says the
Stymphs have fled from it. The next
step is — ”

“To kill Rmanths?” suggested some-
one, a bolder spirit among the hearers.

“The next step,” finished Hok, “is
to get rid of that tyrant Krol.”

Krol had drawn back into a sort of
tangle of branches and vines, which
would serve as a partial screen against
any rush. He snarled, and hefted his
ivory-bladed axe in one hand.

“You speak truth, Hok,” put in
Soko, more boldly than before. “Go
ahead and kill Krol.”

But Hok shook his golden shock-
head. “No. I could have done that
minutes ago, with a quick arrow, or a
flick of my axe. But I have left him
for you yourselves to destroy. He is
your calamity, your shame. He should
be your victim.”

Krol made play with his axe. “I will
hew you all into little shreds!” he
threatened in a high, choked voice.
Soko was the first to see how fright-
ened the old despot was. He addressed
his fellows:

“Men of my people, if I kill Krol,
will I be your chief?” he asked. “Such
is custom.”

Several made gestures of assent, and
Soko was satisfied.

“Then I challenge him now.” With
no wait for further ceremony, Soko put
out one lean, knowing hand and bor-
rowed a weapon from the woven girdle
of a neighbor. It was a sort of pick,
a heavy, sharp piece of bone lashed
crosswise in the cleft of a long, springy
rod. He approached Krol’s position.

“Come and be killed,” Soko bade his
chief, in a sort of chant. “Come and be
killed. Come and — ”

Krol came, for he was evidently not
too afraid of anything like an even bat-
tle. Hok, a giant and a stranger, had
terrified him. The repudiation of the
whole tribe had unmanned him. But
if Soko was alone a challenger, Krol in-
tended to take care of his end.

There was still pith in his pudgy old
arm as he swung the ivory axe at Soko.
The younger warrior parried the blow
within a span’s distance of his face,
missed a return stroke with the pick. A
moment later they were fencing furi-
ously and quite skillfully, skipping to
and fro on the shaky footing. Hok,
who had a fighting man’s appreciation
of duelling tactics, watched with in-
terest.

“Well battled!” he voiced his ap-

178

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

plause. “Strike lower, Soko, his guard
is high I Protect your head! Don’t
stumble or — Hail Now he is yours!”

JNDEED, it seemed so. Krol had

feinted Soko into a downward
sweep with the pick, and had slipped
away from the danger. With Soko
momentarily off balance, Krol struck
with his axe; but a quick upward jerk
of Soko’s weapon-butt struck his wrist,
numbing it. The axe fell among the
trampled leaf-mold on the branchy mat.
Krol was left unarmed before Soko.

Now despair made the challenged
chief truly dangerous. Krol sprang
before Soko could land a last and fata)
stroke. He threw his arms around
Soko’s body, and sank his sharp fangs
into Soko’s flesh at juncture of neck
and shoulder. The two scrambled, fell,
and rolled over and over, perilously
close to a terrible fall. The chatter-
ing onlookers danced and gesticulated
in pleased excitement.

Hok, whose own teeth were far too
even for use as weapons, was about
to remark that biting seemed grossly
unfair, when the issue was decided.
Soko tore loose from the grip of Krol’s
jaws and turned the old man under-
neath. Krol doubled a leg and strove
to rip Soko’s abdomen open with the
nails of his strong, flexible toes, but a
moment later Soko had hooked his own
thumbs into Krol’s mouth corners. He
forced his enemy’s head back and back,
until the neck was on the point of break-
ing. With a coughing whine, Krol let
go all holds, jerked himself free, and
next moment ran for his life.

At once the spectators gave a fierce
shout, and joined the chase. Hok, fol-
lowing over the swaying mass of
boughs, could hear a hundred execra-
tions being hurled at once. Apparently
every man and woman, and most of the
children, among the tree-folk had a

heavy score to settle with the fierce old
fraud who had ruled them. Soko, lead-
ing the pack, almost caught up with
Krol. But Krol avoided his grasp, and
disappeared into something.

Hok came up, pushing in among the
yelling tree-men. He saw a new curios-
ity — Krol’s fortress.

It was made like the nest of a mud-
wasp, a great egg-shaped structure of
clay among the heavier branches of a
tall tree. Apparently Krol had spent
considerable time and thought on his
refuge, against just such an emergency
as this. Hok judged that within was a
baskety plaiting of chosen branches,
with the clay built and worked on the
outside thickly and smoothly. The
whole rondure was twice Krol’s height
from top to bottom, and almost the
same distance through. It was strongly
lodged among several stout forks, and
had but one orifice. This was a dark
doorway, just large enough for Krol to
slip through and perhaps a thought too
narrow for shoulders the width of
Soko’s.

“Krol’s nest is well made,” Hok pro-
nounced, with frank admiration. “My
own tribesmen sometimes make their
huts like this, of branches with an outer
layer of earth. Why' are not all your
homes so built?”

npHE yelling had died down. Soko,
his big eyes watching the doorway
to the mud-nest, made reply: “Only

Krol could fetch clay. We dare not
go to the valley’s floor after It.”

“No,” rejoined a grumble from in-
side. “Nor do you dare go after —
water!"

That reminder plainly frightened
every hearer. They drew back from
the den of Krol, looked at each other
and at Soko.

“What does he mean?” demanded
Hok. “Water does he say? When it

HOK VISITS THE LAND OF LEGENDS

179

comes to that, where do you get water?”
Soko pointed to the opening. “He
gets it. Krol.” Soko’s throat, still tom
and chewed from the battle, worked
and gulped. “We should have thought
of that. Without Krol, we can get
nothing to drink.”

One or two of his hearers made moan-
ing sounds and licked their mouths, as
if already dry and thirsty. Hok ques-
tioned Soko further. It developed that
the tree-folk had big dry gourd-vessels,
fashioned from the fruit of lofty vines,
and these they let down on cords of
fiber. Krol, the single individual who
would venture to the ground level,
scooped up water from a stream there,
and the others would draw it up for
their own use. Hok nodded, praising
in his heart the wisdom of Krol.

“It is yet another way in which he
kept his rule over you,” he commented.
“Yet Krol must die some day. How
would you drink then?”

“When I die, you all die,” pro-
nounced Krol from his fastness. “I de-
clare you all in danger. Without me
to guide your gourds into that stream,
thirst will claim you one by one.”
Silence. Then a wretched little man
attempted a different question:

“What is your will, mighty Krol?”
Krol kept majestic silence for a mo-
ment. Finally:

“You will all swear to obey my rules
and my thoughts, even unspoken
wishes. You will range far to pluck all
the fruits I like, and bring them to
me. You will yield Soko up as a vic-
tim — ”

“Wait, you tree people 1” burst out
Hok in disgust. “I see you wavering 1
Do you truly mean to let that murderer
destroy Soko, who is the best man
among you?”

Nobody answered. Hok saw them
stare sickly. Krol went on:

“I have not finished. Soko as a vic-

tim, I say. And also this troublesome
stranger, Hok. Their blood will in-
crease my walls.”

CHAPTER IX
The Hot Hunger Obfigei

pOR a moment Hok had an over-
powering sense of having guessed
wrong.

He had spoken the truth when he an-
nounced that the killing of Krol was
the tree-men’s responsibility, not his.
Violent death was no novelty in his life,
and he had inflicted enough of it on
large, strong foes to be hesitant about
attacking weak, unworthy ones. Too,
he had no wish to take on the rule of
Krol’s people as an additional chore.
If Soko, who seemed a fair chieftainly
type, did the killing, then Soko would
confirm himself as leader. Hok could
depart from this Ancient Land with a
clear conscience.

But just now his half-languid for-
bearance was shunting him into another
nasty situation. Three or four of the
men were murmuring together, and
there was a stealthy movement of the
clan’s whole fighting strength in the di-
rection of Soko. At once Hok pushed
forward at and among them. Quick
flicks of his open hands scattered them
like shavings in the wind.

“Fools 1” he scolded them. “Weak
of wit! You deserve no better than a
life roosting in these trees. Soko and
I have brought you to the edge of free-
dom, and you cannot take advantage!”

“That is good talk,” seconded Soko,
with considerable stoutness. “Krol has
fled before me. Since he will not fight,
I am chief. Let any one man among
you come and strive with me if he
thinks otherwise.”

The half-formed uprising was
quelled. One or two men fidgeted.

180

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

Said one: “But who will fetch us
water?”

“Who but Krol?” chimed in the old
rascal from behind his mud walls. “I
make no more offers until you come to
me with thirsty throats, begging.”

The speaker glanced sidelong at Hok.
He half-whispered: “Krol wants the

blood of Soko and the stranger — ”

“He shall have blood enough and to
spare, if you even think of fighting,”
Hok cut him off roughly. “Krol spoke
of using it Tor the thickness of his
walls.’ What did he mean?”

Soko pointed to the den. “He riiixes
earth with blood, and it turns into
stone.”

Hok came toward the big egg of
clay, and saw that Soko spoke truth.
The texture of that fortress was more
than simple dried mud. Hok prodded
it with his finger, then a dagger-point,
finally swung his axe against it. He
made no more than a dint. Even his
strength and weapons could not strip
that husk from Krol.*

“Hai, the old coward has built
strongly,” he granted. “Well, the front
door is open. Shall I fetch him out?”
Soko nodded eagerly, and Hok cut
a long straight shoot from a nearby
branch. This he poked in through the
entrance hole. It encountered softness,
and Hok grinned at the howl that came
back. Then the end of the stick was
seized inside, and he grinned more
widely.

“Do you think to match pulls with
Hok?” he queried. “A single twitch,
and you come out among us.”

* Blood and earth, mixed into a primitive
cement, dates back to long before the dawn of
history. It is fairly universal among the simple
races of the world, and is used to make durable
hut-floors in both Africa and South America.
The blending calls for considerable judgment and
labor; the author has seen samples, and has tried
to imitate them for himself, but with only in-
different success. — Ed.

CUTTING action to word, he gave his
end a sharp tug. Krol let go, and
Hok almost fell over backward as the
stick came into view.

But upon it was something that made
the tree- folk scream with one voice of
horror, while Hok himself felt a cold
chill of dismay.

Krol had clung to the end of the
stick only long enough to attach a
peculiar and unpleasant weapon of his
own — -a small, frantic snake banded in
black and orange. This creature came
spiralling along the pole toward Hok,
plainly angry and looking for trouble.
Hok dropped the pole, grabbing for his
bow. Fallen upon the woven floor, the
snake turned from him to Soko, who
was nearest at the moment. Soko
scrambled away, bellowing in fear.

But then Hok had sent an arrow at
it, and spiked it to a lichen-covered
stub of bough that thrust into view
from the platform. The ugly little
creature lashed to and fro like a worm
on a fish-hook. Its flat head, heavily
jowled with poison sacs, struck again
and again at the shaft that pierced it.

“ Wagh !” cried Hok, and spat in dis-
gust. “The touch of that fang is. death.
Does Krol live with such friends?”

“Snakes do not bite Krol,” volun-
teered Soko, returning shakily.

“I do not blame them,” rejoined
Hok. “Well, he seems prepared for
any assault. Siege is the alternative.”

“I am thirsty,” piped up a child from
behind its watching mother. Hok or-
dered a search for milk-nuts, and half
the tribe went swinging away through
the boughs to bring them. Soko lin-
gered at Hok’s elbow.

“Hok! Only the death of Krol will
save us. There are some in the tribe
who will slay us if we sleep, if we relax
watch even — ”

“And your blood will plaster my
walls afresh,” promised Krol, overhear-

HOK VISITS THE LAND OF LEGENDS

181

ing.

Hok made another close inspection of
KroPs defenses, keeping sharp lookout
lest Krol turn more snakes upon him.
He hacked experimentally at several
of the branches that supported the
structure, but they were tough and
thick, would take days to sever. After
a moment, inspiration came to him.
He began to prune at nearby twigs and
sticks, paying especial attention to dry,
dead wood. Soon he had cleared most
of the small branches from around the
den, and stacked his cuttings carefully
to one side.

“What will you do to force him out?”
asked Soko.

“It is not I who will force him out,”
replied Hok cryptically. “It is my
friend, the Hot Hunger.”

“The Hot Hunger!” repeated Krol
and his voice sounded hollow.

THE nut-gatherers returned, Hok
gave them another errand, the col-
lection of small faggots of dry branches.
They obeyed readily, for Krol voiced no
more threats, and Soko was acting the
part of a chief. As the little stores of
fuel came in, Hok began to peg and
tie them to the outside of the clay den.
Finally, while all watched in round-
eyed wonder, he fished forth his fire-
making apparatus.

Upon a thick carpet of green leaves
he kindled the smallest of fires. All
but Soko, who had seen fire-building
once before, whimpered and drew away.
Hok was all the more glad, for he
wanted no crowding and bough-shaking
to set the tree tops ablaze. Having
found and kindled a torch to his lik-
ing, he stamped out the rest of the fire
with his moccasin heel and returned to
the fuel-festooned den of Krol.

He ignited the broken, splintery end
of a twig. It flared up, and other pieces
of wood likewise. Hok nodded ap-

proval of his work.

“See, it will soon be night,” he an-
nounced. “Will someone bring me a
little food? I shall watch here.”

“Watch what?” asked one of the tree
folk.

“Krol’s embarrassment. Where are
some of those milk-nuts?”

Twilight was coming on, with dusk
to follow. Most of the tree-men led
their families to distant nests, peering
back in worried wonder. Soko re-
mained with Hok.

“You are going to burn Krol,”
guessed Soko, but Hok shook his head
in the firelight, and pegged more sticks
to the blood-mingled clay.

“Help me to spread thick, moist
leaves to catch any fire that falls, Soko.
No, Krol will not wait long enough to
be burned. Eventually he will come
forth to face us.”

From within the den came a stronge
sound, half wheeze and half snarl.

“You are a devil, Hok,” Krol was
mumbling. “It grows hot in here.”

Soko was encouraged. “Come and
be killed,” he set up his chant of chal-
lenge. “Come and be killed. Come
and be killed.”

Krol wheeze-snarled again, and fell
silent. Hok fed his fire judiciously.
The blood-clay cement was scorching
hot to his fingertips. Dusk swiftly be-
came night.

“Hok, listen,” ventured Krol after a
time. “You and I are reasonable men.
Perhaps I was wrong to make an enemy
of you. You are wrong to remain an
enemy of mine. I have it in mind that
you and I could do great things. Your
strength, with my wits — ”

“This talk is not for bargaining, but
to throw us off guard,” Hok remarked
sagely to Soko.

COKO peered into the dark opening
of the den. “Come and be killed,”

182

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

he invited Krol.

Krol wheezed again, this time with a
sort of sob as obligato.

“Your hearts are as hard as ivory,”
he accused shakily. “I am old and
feeble. The things I did may have
been mistakes, but I was trying to
help my people. Now I must die
horribly, of the Hot Hunger, because
a big yellow-haired stranger has no
mercy.”

Hok lashed a handful of fresh fuel
together with a green vine and tied it
to a peg he had worked into the clay,
setting this new wood afire.

“I judge that Krol is at his most
dangerous now,” be told Soko. “Be-
ware of those who seek to make you
sorrow for them. Tears bedim the
eyes.”

“Come and be killed,” repeated Soko.

He had come quite close to the open-
ing, and Krol made his last bid for
victory and safety.

He dived forth, swift and deadly as
the little coral snake he had attempted
to use against Hok. The impact of his
pudgy old body was enough to bowl
over the unready Soko.

Winding his legs and one arm around
the body of his younger rival, he
plied with his free hand a long bone
dagger.

Hok, on the other side of the fiery
den, hurried around just in time to
see two grappled bodies roll over, and
then fall through a gap in the broad
mat. Two yells beat up through the
night — Soko’s voice raised in startled
pain, Krol’s in fierce triumph. Then,
as Hok reached the gap, there was only
one voice: '

“There, Soko, hang like a beetle on
a thorn! You shall have time to think
of my power before you die! I, Krol,
depart for Rrmanths, my only friend,
whom I shall feed fat with the corpses
of my rebellious people!”

CHAPTER X

Hok Accepts a Challenge

TN THE complete darkness, climbing

might have been a dire danger; but
the fire that still burned around the
abandoned fortress of Krol shed light
below. Hok was able to find footing
among the branches, and to descend
with something of speed.

At a distance of some twenty paces
below the matted mid-floor of the
jungle, he found Soko. His friend
seemed to dangle half across a swaying
branch-tip, struggling vaguely with in-
effectual flaps of arms and legs. Of
Krol there was no glimpse or sound.

“Soko, you still live!” cried Hok.
“Come with me, we will hunt for Krol
together!” »

“But I cannot come,” wheezed Soko,
pain in his voice.

A sudden up-blazing of the fire over-
head gave them more light, and Hok
saw the plight that Soko was in.

Evidently Krol and Soko had fallen
upon the branch, Soko underneath. As
earlier in the day with Hok and the
Stymph, so in this case the lower figure
in the impact had been momentarily
stunned. Krol, above, had taken that
moment to strike downward with the
big bone dagger, pouring all his
strength into the effort.

That dagger had pierced Soko’s body
on the left side, coming out beyond and
driving deep into the wood of the
branch. As Krol himself had put it,
Soko was like a beetle on a thorn. “I
cannot come,” he moaned again, mak-
ing shift to cling to the branch with
both hands, to ease the drag on his
wound.

Hok balanced himself on the bough,
and began to work his way out toward
the unhappy tree-man. There was no
nearby branch by which to hold on or to

HOK VISITS THE LAND OF LEGENDS

183

share Hok’s weight. The single out-
ward shoot swayed and crackled be-
neath him. He drew back to safer
footing.

“I must find another way to him,”
muttered Hok, tugging his golden
beard. Then, he thought of such a way,
and began to climb upward again.

“Don't leave me,” pleaded Soko
wretchedly.

“Courage,” Hok replied, and
searched among branches for what he
needed. He found it almost at once —
a clumsy mass of vines, strong and pli-
able as leather thongs. Quickly he cut
several of the sturdiest strands, knot-
ting them together. Then he located a
stronger branch which extended above
the one where Soko was imprisoned.
He slid out alonfe it, and made fast one
end of his improvised line.

“I am in pain,” Soko gasped, his
voice weak and trembling.

“Courage!” Hok exhorted him again.
He hung axe, bow, quiver and pouch
on a stout stub of the base branch.
Then he swung down by the knotted
vines, descending hand under hand to-
ward Soko.

He came to a point level with the un-
fortunate prisoner of the wedged dag-
ger, and almost within reach. By shift-
ing his weight he made the cord swing,
and was able to hook a knee over the
lower bough. Then, holding on by a
hand just above a knot in the vines, he
put out his other hand to the knife that
transfixed Soko.

Even as he touched it, Soko gave a
shudder and went limp. He had
fainted.

Hok was more glad than otherwise,
and forthwith tugged on the tight-stuck
weapon with all his strength. It left its
lodgment in the wood, and came easily
out of Soko's flesh. With nothing to
hold him to his lodgment, Soko dropped
into emptiness.

TTOK made a quick pincer-like clutch
with his legs. He caught Soko
between his knees, as in a wrestling
hold. His single hand hold on the vine
was almost stripped away, but he
grimly made it support the double
weight. The bone dagger he set be-
tween his teeth. Then, still holding the
senseless Soko by pressure of his knees,
he over handed himself upward again.
He achieved a seat on the larger branch,
and laid Soko securely upon a broad
base of several spreading shoots.

Soko bled, but not too profusely.
Krol had struck hastily for all his
vicious intent, and the knife had pierced
the muscles of chest and armpit, just
grazing the ribs without hurting a single
vital organ. Hok quickly gathered
handfuls of leaves, laying them upon
the double wound and letting the blood
glue them fast for a bandage. In the
midst of these ministrations Soko’s wide
eyes opened again.

“You saved me, Hok,” he said in a
voice full of trembling gratitude. “That
makes twice or three times. Krol — ”
“He still lives,” rejoined Hok grimly,
repossessing himself of his weapons.
“Perhaps he steals upon us even now.”
Soko's brilliant eyes quested here and
there in the night. “I think not,” he
said. “I have command of myself
again. Shall we go upward?”

His wound was troublesome and he
climbed stiffly, but he was back to the
side of the dying fire well before Hok.
“I thirst,” he complained.

“Because you have lost blood,” Hok
told him, and took a fiery stick to light
the inside of Krol's abandoned den.
Among the great quantity of posses-
sions he saw several gourds. One of
these proved to be full of water, warm
but good. He gave it to the thankful
Soko.

Soko drank, and passed the gourd to
Hok. “How can we kill Krol now, my

184

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

friend?” he asked. “Because we must
kill him. You understand that.”

Hok nodded, drinking in turn. “You
shall do it without my help, so as to be
chief according to custom. My task
will be to destroy Rmanth, and roast
him for your people. I made such a
promise.”

“Promise?” repeated Soko. “Who
can keep a promise like that?”

“I have never broken a promise in
my life, Soko. Here, help me put out
this fire, lest some coals destroy the
jungle. And tell me how we shall find
Rmanth.”

Soko could not do so. His only ven-
tures to the ground had been by way
of the vine-spiral tube in which Hok
had first found him. He reiterated
that Krol, and Krol alone, possessed the
courage and knowledge to face Rmanth
and come away unhurt.

“Well, then, where do you let down
gourds for water?”

“Near the hollow tube. Why?”
“Tomorrow all the tree-dwellers shall
have fresh water. That is another of
Hok’s promises. Will you watch while
I sleep, Soko? Later waken me, and
sleep yourself.”

gOKO agreed, and Hok stretched out
wearily upon ferny leafage. He
closed his eyes and drifted off into im-
mediate slumber.

Sleeping, he dreamed.

He thought he saw a marshalling of
his old enemies. He himself was ap-
parently arrayed singly against a bale-
ful mob. In the forefront was Kimri,
the black-bearded giant from whom he
had won the lovely Oloana. There was
also Cos, a paunchy, nasty-eyed fellow
who had ruled the walled town of Tlanis
until Hok adventured thither and
changed all that. Over the head of
Cos looked Romm, who once made the
bad guess that renegading among the

Gnorrls would give him victory over
Hok’s Flint Folk. Djoma the Fisher
slunk pretty well to the back, for he
was never over-enthusiastic about fight-
ing Hok man to man. It was a delight-
ful throng of menaces.*

“I will have the pleasure of slaying
you all a second time,” Hok greeted
them, and rushed. One hand swung his
axe, the other jabbed and fenced with
a javelin. In his dream, those second
killings seemed much easier than had
the first. The ancient enemies fell be-
fore him like stalks of wild rice before
a swamp-buffalo. He mustered the
breath in his deep chest to thunder a
cry of triumph, when —

They seemed to fade away, and at
the same time to mould and compact
themselves into yet another form. This
one was hairy, pudgy, grizzled, but
active. Bestial lips writhed and flut-
tered, wide eyes that could see in the
dark glared.

“So, you big yellow-haired hulk!”
choked a voice he knew, beside itself
with rage. “I find you unprepared, I
kill you thus!”

Hok threw himself forward, under
the stroke of some half-seen weapon.
His hands struck soft flesh, and he
heard the threatening words shrill away
into a shriek.

Then the dream became reality.

Dawn had come. Soko, wounded
and weary, had dozed off during his
watch, and Krol had returned to take
his vengeance.

Only Hok’s sense of danger, shaking
him back to wakefulness, had given him
the moment of action needed before a
blow fell. Krol had poised a big club,

* For fuller accounts of these characters and
what happened to them, see “Battle in the Dawn,”
January ’39 Amazing Stories; “Hok Goes to At-
lantis,” December ’39, Amazing Stories; “Hok
Draws the Bow,” May ’40, Amazing Stories; “Hok
and the Gift of Heaven,” March ’41, Amazing
Stories. — Ed.

HOK VISITS THE LAND OF LEGENDS

185

a piece of thorn-wood stout enough to
break the skull of a horse. This
weapon now swished emptily in air, as
Hok grappled and held helpless the
gray old sinner.

“Soko 1 Soko 1 ” called Hok loudly.

Soko loooked up, washing the sleep
from his own eyes. “Eh?” he yawned,
then he too was aware of the danger.
He sprang up.

“Soko,” said Hok, “I swore that you
would kill this man and become chief-
tain in his place. Do so now. Do not
let him escape once more.”

Soko drew a dagger. Hok let go of
Krol.

r 'PHE deposed ruler of the tree-men
made a last effort to break for
safety, but Hok blocked his retreat.
Then Soko caught Krol by his long
hair. The dagger he held — it was the
same big bone blade that had spiked
Soko to the branch last night — darted
into the center of Krol’s chest. Blood
bubbled out. The old despot collapsed,
dying.

The wakening tree-people were hur-
rying from all sides to stare and ques-
tion. Hok clapped Soko’s unwounded
shoulder.

“Obey your new chief,” he urged the
gathering. “Be afraid of him, follow
him, respect him. He is your leader
and your father.”

Krol looked up, blood on his wide
mouth. “What about the water?” he
sneered, and with a coughing gobble he
died.

There was silence, and Soko, in the
first moment of his power, could only
look to Hok for guidance.

“People of the trees,” said Hok, “I
have been challenged. Krol was bad
and deserved death. But he spoke the
truth when he reminded us that water
was not at hand while Rmanth roamed
below. In other words, Rmanth must

be destroyed. I promised that, did I
not?” He balanced his axe in one hand,
and nodded to Soko. “Come chief. We
will arrange the matter.”

Soko followed him, trying not to seem
too laggardly. Hok raised his voice:
“Go to the usual place, you others, and
let down your gourds. Water shall be
yours, now and forever after.”

He and Soko came to the tube that
gave sheltered descent to the ground
level. Hok entered it first, swinging
downward by the rough ladder-rungs.
Soko for once did not climb faster than
he. Hok came to the floor of the cavity,
and without hesitation wriggled through
the lower opening into the outer air,
standing upon the damp earth of the
valley bottom. Soko had to be called
twice before he followed.

“Look around for that stream of
water,” directed Hok. “There, isn’t
that it, showing through the stems be-
low us? Come on, Soko. You are a
chief now.”

At that word, Soko drew himself up.
“Yes, I am a chief,” he said sturdily.
“I will do what a chief should do, even
though Rmanth eats me.”

“You shall eat Rmanth instead,”
Hok said confidently. “But first, the
water.”

They came to the edge of the stream.
Gourds dangled down from above, on
lengthy vine strings. Hok and Soko
guided them into the water, and tugged
for them to be drawn up. Glad cries
beat down from the upper branches, as
the hoisters felt the comforting weight
of the containers.

“The voices will bring Rmanth,”
Soko said dully.

Hok glanced over his shoulder. “He
is already here. Leave him to me. Go
on and fill gourds.”

He turned from Soko and walked
back among the trees, toward the gray
bulk with its six knobby horns and

1*6

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

hungry tusks.

“I have a feeling that this was
planned for both of us,” Hok addressed
the elephant-pig . “Cpme then. We
will race, play and fight, and it shall end
when one of us is dead.”

CHAPTER XI

The Termination of Rmanth

gEVERAL accounts have descended
to us of how Hok raced, played and
fought that day.* But names have
been changed, some facts have been
altered for the sake of ritual or ro-
mance. In any case, Hok himself talked
little about the business, for such was
not his way. The only narrators were
the tree-folk, who did not see much
of what happened. Which makes the
present story valuable as new light on
an old, old truth.

Hok saw that Rmanth was at least
six times more angry than when they
had met last. The arrow in his tongue
had evidently broken off or worked its
way out, though pink-tinted foam
flecked Rmanth’s great protruding
tusks. The arrow in his nostril still re-
mained, and his ugly snout was swollen

* The myth that. will rise quickest to the reader’s
memory is the one concerning Hercules and his
conquest of the mighty wild boar of Eurymanthis.
It is odd, or not 60 odd, that Greek myths tell the
same story in several forms. Thus Theseus, who
may be another memory of Hercules or Hok, de-
stroys such a giant swine in his youthful journey
to his father’s court. Meleager hunts and kills the
Calydonian boar. And one of the Tuscan heroes
of Latin Legend, named in “The Lays of Ancient
Rome'’ as an adversary of Horatius, won his
fame by killing a boar “that wasted fields and
slaughtered men.”

Such super-swine are described as unthinkably
huge and strong, clumsy but swift, with fierce and
voracious natures that made them a menace to
whole communities and districts. Not even the
European wild boar, wicked fighter though it is,
could approximate such character and perform-
ance. It becomes increasingly sure that Rmanth,
the boar of Eurymanthis, and those others, trace
back to tales of the now extinct Dirioceras. — Ed.

and sore. His eyes remained cold and
cunning, but as Hok came near they
lighted with a pale glow of recognition.

“You know me, then,” Hok said.
“What have we to say and do to each
other?”

Rmanth replied by action, a bolting
direct charge.

Tree-thickets sprouted between the
two, but Rmanth clove and ploughed
among them like a bull among reeds.
His explosion into attack was so sud-
den, so unwarned, so swift, that Hok’s
sideward leap saved him barely in time.
As it was, the bristly flank of the beast
touched him lightly as it drove by.
Rmanth, missing that first opportunity
to finish this maddening enemy, turned
as nimbly as a wild horse, head writhed
around on the huge shoulders and hor-
rid fangs gaping for a crushing bite.

Hok hurriedly conquered an in-
stinctive urge to spring clear — such a
spring\ would only have mixed him up
in the brush, and Rmanth’s second
pounce would have captured him.
The part of wisdom was to come
close, and Hok did so. He placed
one hand against Rmanth’s great quiv-
ering haunch, the other hand grasping
his bow-stave. As the big brute spun
to snap at him, Hok followed the
haunches around. Rmanth could not
get quite close enough to seize him.
As the two of them circled, Hok saw a
way into the open, and took it at once.
He slipped around and behind a big
tree. Rmanth, charging violently after,
smote that tree heavily. Hok laughed,
then headed toward the slope which he
had traveled the day before.

Rmanth’s thick head must have
buzzed from that impact against the
tree. He stood swaying his rftuzzle ex-
perimentally, planting his forefeet
widely. Hok had done all his maneuv-
erings with an arrow laid ready across
his bow, held in place with his left fore-

HOK VISITS THE LAND OF LEGENDS

187

finger. Now he had time to draw it
fully and send it singing at Rmanth’s
face.

As before, he aimed at the eye. This
time his aim was not spoiled. The shaft
drove deep into one cold, wicked orb,
and Rmanth rose suddenly to his mas-
sive hind-quarters, an upright colossus,
pawing the air and voicing a horrible
cry of pain. Such a cry has been
imagined only once by modern man,
and the imaginer was both a scholar
and a master of fantasy* Hok clinched
forever his right to his reputation of
stout-heartedness. He laughed a second
time.

“An arrow in your other eye, and
you’ll be at my mercy!” said he, reach-
ing over his shoulder for another shaft
in his quiver.

But there was not another shaft in
his quiver.

npHE battlings with the Stymphs, his
knocking of the milknut from an
assailant’s hand, the hurried destruc-
tion of Krol’s gaudy snake had used up
his store of shafts. If Rmanth was
half-blinded, Hok was wholly without
missiles. He felt a cold wave of dis-
may for a moment, but only for a mo-
ment.

“Perhaps I was not fair to think of
hacking and prodding a helpless enemy
to death,” he reflected. “This makes
a more even battle of it. At any rate,
Rmanth has forgotten that Soko will be
filling the water gourds. Let me play
with him further. Here he comes I”

And here he came, in another of his
mighty bursts of power, swift and re-
sistless as an updriving avalanche.

Hok dared wait longer this time, for

*. . . something between bellowing and whis-
tling, with a kind of sneeze in the middle . . . and
when you’ve once heard it you’ll be quite content.”
-Lewis Carroll, in THROUGH THE LOOKING-
GLASS— Ed.

Rmanth must charge up the hill. He
had quickly returned his bow to its
shoulder loop, and now took a stout
grip on his axe. As the gaping fang-
fringed maw, from which lolled that in-
flamed tongue, was almost upon him,
he sprang aside as before and chopped
at the remaining good eye of Rmanth.
Missing, he struck the gray hide of the
cheek. His heavy flint rebounded like
a hailstone from a hut-roof. Hok turned
and ran., leaping from side to side to
confuse his enemy, and paused near the
great sloping trail down which dying
mammoths were wont to slide them-
selves. A carrion stench assailed his
nostrils, and he remembered his original
quarrel with Rmanth.

“You ate my prey,” he accused the
lumbering hulk, which turned stub-
bornly to pursue him further. “Gra-
gru I trapped, wounded, and chased.
He was mine. He recognied my vic-
tory. But you lolled below here and
gorged yourself on my hunting. You
owe me meat, Rmanth, and I intend to
collect the debt.”

His voice, as usual, maddened the
elephant-pig. When Hok began to
scale the slope backward, Rmanth
breasted the climb with great driving
digs of his massive feet and legs.

But now the advantage was with
Hok. Lighter, neater-footed, he could
move faster on the assent than could
this mighty murderer. Indeed, he
could probably gain the snow-lipped
plain above and escape entirely. But
he did not forget his promise to Soko’s
people. Victory, not flight, was what
he must achieve.

“Come near, Rmanth,” he invited,
moving backward and upward. “I want
a fair chance at you.”

Rmanth complied, surging up the
slanting trail with a sudden new muster
of energy. Hok braced himself and
smote with his axe at Rmanth ’s nose.

188

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

Right between the two forward horns
his blade struck, and again Rmanth
yelled in furious pain. But the blow
only bruised that heavy hide, did not
lay it fully open. Rmanth faltered, and
Hok retreated once more.

“This nightmare cannot be
wounded,” he reflected aloud. “At least
not in the side or head or muzzle, like
an honest beast. What then? The
neck, as with a bull?”*

But there was no way to get to
Rmanth’s neck. He did not charge
with head down, like a stag or bison or
rhinoceros, but with nose up and mouth
open, like a beast of prey. Hok wished
that he had a spear, stout and long. It
might serve his turn. But he had only
the axe, and it must not fail him. He
continued his retirement, along the trail
he remembered from his previous de-
scent.

CO FOR some time, and for consid-
erable rise in altitude. Then, sud-
denly, Rmanth was not crowding Hok
any longer. Hok paused and grimaced
his defiance.

“Tired?” he jeered. “Or afraid?”

Plainly it was the latter, but
Rmanth’s fear was not for Hok. He
turned his one good eye this way and
that, looking up into the sky that at
this point was not very misty. He
sniffed, and wrinkled a very ugly gray
lip that reminded Hok of Krol.

Then Hok remembered. “Oh, yes,

* The sturdiest of animals can be dealt with by
attacking the spine through the nape of the neck.
Most familiar of such attacks is probably the
sword-thrust of the matador in a Spanish bull-
fight. The bull is induced to lower bis head,
bringing into reach a vulnerable spot the size of
one’s open palm at juncture of neck and shoulders.
Elephant and rhinoceros also can be killed by a
proper stab there, since the spinal cord is dose to
the surface, for all the thick, hard hide. Scientists
think that the down-pointing front teeth of the
sabre-tooth tiger— extinct, or very rare, in Hok’s
time — were designed by nature for just such a
mode of killing. — Ed.

the Stymphs. Krol told me that you
did not venture far enough from the
shelter of the trees for them to reach
you. But think no more about them,
Rmanth. I killed most of them. Those
who lived have flown away. Perhaps
the snow will destroy them — they seem
to think it a kinder neighbor than
Hok.”

He moved boldly into an open space
on the slope. Rmanth snorted and
wheezed, seeming to wait for sure doom
to overtake the audacious human. Then
he squinted skyward again, was plainly
reassured, and finally followed Hok up-
ward.

“Well done, elephant-pig I” Hok ap-
plauded. “This is between you and me.
No Stymph will cheat the conqueror.”

More ascent, man and beast toiling
into less tropical belts. Hok found
himself backing into a ferny thicket.
It was here that — yes, wadded into a
fork was his bundle of winter clothing.

As he found it, it seemed that he
found also a plan, left here like the
clothes against his need. He felt like
shouting out one of his laughs, but
smothered it lest Rmanth be placed on
guard. Instead he seized and shook
out the big lion skin that was his main
protection against blizzards. Its shaggy
expanse was blond and bright, like his
own hair.

“See, Rmanth,” he roared, “I run no
more! Catch this!”

He flung the pelt right into Rmanth’s

face.

Next moment those mighty fangs
had dosed upon the fur. The horrid
head bore its prize to earth, holding it
there as if to worry it. His neck was
stooped, the thick skin stretched taut.
. . . Hok hurled himself forward in a
charge.

Before Rmanth was aware that the
hide in his jaws was empty, Hok had
sprung and planted a moccasin upon

HOK VISITS THE LAND OF LEGENDS

189

his nose, between those forward horns.
Rmanth emitted a whistling grunt and
tossed upward, as a bull tosses. Hok
felt himself flipped Into the air, and for
a moment he soared over the neck-
nape, the very position he hoped for.

Down slammed his axe, even as he
hurtled. It struck hard, square, and
true across the spine of Rmanth, back
of the shallow skull. Hok’s arms tingled
with the back-snap of that effort, and
his body was flung sidewise by it.

But Rmanth was down, stunned or
smashed. He floundered to his knees.
Hok ran to him, dagger out. A thrust,
a powerful dragging slash, and the thick
hide was torn open. Once more the axe
rose and fell. The exposed spinal ver-
tebrae broke beneath the impact with
a sound like a tree splitting on a frosty
night.

Rmanth relaxed, and abruptly rolled
down slope, as dead mammoths were
wont to roll. Hok saved his last breath,
forbearing to shout his usual signal of
victory. Snatching up his crumpled
lion-skin cloak, he dashed swiftly
downward in pursuit of that big lump
of flesh he had killed.

CHAPTER XII

The Feast and the Farewell

'T'HOSE men, women and children
who had been Soko’s tree-people sat
at last on the solid soil, stockaded about
with the mighty trees of the jungle, and
roofed over with the impenetrable mat
of foliage, vines and mould that had
once been their floor and footing. They
sat in a circle near the brink of the
stream, and in the circle’s center was a
cheerful cooking-fire of Hok’s making.
The air was heavy with the smell of
roast meat.

There had been enough of Rmanth
for all, and more than enough. Once

Hok had found Soko and shown him the
carcass, it had been possible, though
not easy, to coax the other men down
to ground level. And it had taken all
the muscle of the tribe, tugging wearily
on tough vine-strands, to drag Rmanth
to the waterside. After that, it was an
additional labor, with much blunting of
bone knives, to flay away his great
armor of hide. But when the great
wealth of red meat was exposed, and
Hok had instructed the most apt of the
tribe in the cooking thereof- — ah, after
that it was a fulfillment of the most
ancient dreams about paradise and
plenty.

Three or four tribesmen were toast-
ing last delectable morsels on green
twigs in the outlying beds of coals.
More of them lolled and even slept in
heavy surfeit, assured that no great
trampling foe would overtake and de-
stroy them. The children, who no
amount of gorging could quiet down,
were skipping and chattering in the im-
memorial game of tag. To one side
sat Soko, on a boulder that was caught
between gnarled roots, and his pose was
that of a benevolent ruler.

A comely young woman of his people
was applying a fresh dressing of astrin-
gent herbs and leaves to the wound
Krol had made the night before.
Grandly Soko affected not to notice the
twinges of pain or the attractions of the
attendant. He spoke with becoming
gravity to Hok, who lounged near with
his back against a tree, his big flint axe
cuddled crosswise on his lap.

“There is much more meat than my
people will ever finish,” Soko observed.

“Build fires of green wood, that will
make thick smoke,” Hok directed. “In
that smoke hang thin slices of the meat
that is left. It will be dried and pre-
served so as to keep for a long time,
and make other meals for your tribe.”

Soko eyed Hok’s bow, which leaned

190

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

against the tree beside him. “That dart-
caster of yours is a wonderful weapon,”
he observed. “I have drawn two shafts,
still good, from Rmanth’s body. If I
can make a bow like it — ”

“Take this one,” said Hok gener-
ously, and passed it over. “I have many
more, as good or better, in my own
home village. Study the kind of wood
used, how it is shaped and rigged, and
copy it carefully. Your men can hunt
more meat. A jungle like this must
have deer and pig and perhaps cattle.
Since your people have tasted roasted
flesh, they will want more on which to
increase their strength.”

“We will keep coals from that cook-
ing fire,” said Soko.

“Do more than that,” Hok urged.
“You have seen my fire-sticks and how
I used them. Make some for yourself,
that the fire may be brought to you
when you need it.” He peered around
him. “See, Soko, there are outcroppings
of hard rock near and far. I see gran-
ite, a bit of jasper, and here and there
good flints. Use those to make tools
and weapons instead of bone or ivory.”

'T'HE dressing of Soko’s wound was
A completed. Soko dismissed the
young woman with a lordly gesture, but
watched her appreciatively as she de-
murely departed. Then he turned back
to his guest. His smile took from his
face the strange beast-look that clung
to the wide loose lips and chinless jaw.

“Hok,” he said, “we shall never for-
get these wonders you have done for us,
and which you have taught us to do for
ourselves. In future times, when you
deign to come again — ”

“But I shall not come again,” Hok
told him.

Soko looked surprised and hurt.
Hok continued:

“You and I are friends, Soko. : It is
our nature to be friendly, unless some-

one proves himself an enemy. But
your people and my people are too dif-
ferent. There would be arguments and
difficulties between them, and then
fights and trouble. When I leave here,
it will be forever. I shall not tell at
once what I have seen. What I tell
later will be only part of the truth.
Because I think you and your kind
will be better off untroubled and un-
known in this valley.”

Soko nodded slowly, his eyes thought-
ful. “I had been counting on your help
from time to time,” he confessed. “Per-
haps experience will help me, though.
What shall we do here after you are
gone?”

“Be full of mystery,” said Hok sen-
tentiously. “The Stymphs seem to have
flown away, but their reputation will
linger over your home. I judge that
game does not prowl near, and only
the mammoth knows the valley— to
dive into it and die. If ever a hunter
of my sort comes near, it will be the
veriest accident.

“Thus you will have the chance to
make your people strong and wise.
They have regained the full right to
walk on the ground and breathe air
under open skies, which right was de-
nied by Krol. In times to come, I ven-
ture to say, you shall issue forth as a
race to be great in the outer world.
Meanwhile, stay secret. Your secrecy
is safe with me.” *

He rose, and so did Soko. They
shook hands.

“You depart now, at only the be-
ginning of things?” Soko suggested.

“The adventure and the battle, at
least, are at an end,” Hok reminded
him. “I am tormented by a sickness
of the mind, Soko, which some call

* Again referring to the Greek myths, there is
the tale of how Hercules came close to the Gar-
den of the Hesperides, a fruitful paradise guarded
by dragons. Now we know the source of that
story. — Ed.

HOK VISITS THE LAND OF LESENDS

191

curiosity. It feeds on strife, travel and
adventure. And so I go home to the
northward, to find if my people do not
know of such things to comfort me.
Goodbye, Soko. I wish you joy of your
Ancient Land.”

He picked up his furs and his axe,
and strode away toward the trail up
the slope. Behind him he heard Soko’s
people lifting a happy noise that was
probably their method of singing.

The End.

« ODDITIES OF SCIENCE »

UNDER ONE COVER
npHE latest edition of Webster’s New Intema-
tiona! dictionary contains 600,000 entries, has

12.000 illustrations, 35,000 geographical references,

13.000 biographical, contains 3,350 pages and
costs over a million and a quarter dollars to com-
pile. It took Webster’s word specialists eight years
to turn out their latest second edition. They
needed the help of two hundred and seven other
authorities who were called in to give their ex-
perience and knowledge in their particular fields.
Take the word “goon” for example: it won’t be
included in Webster’s dictionary until it has been
properly defined by labor experts. The same ap-
plies to words like “fink,” “Quisling,” and “fifth
columnist.” These words must be defined by ex-
perts who use them.

Contrary to popular belief, usage determines
what words get into the dictionary. Many moss-
backed English teachers insist that a word isn’t
correct unless the dictionary says so. Well, then
take the word “ain’t”. At one time you were con-
sidered something of an illiterate wag if you used
that word. Now, though considered improper, it Is
used by the best of us and is far from vulgar.

Dictionaries are built much in the same manner
as a brick wall is put together, bride by brick.
Noah Webster’s first modest dictionary contained
but 38,000 words. The first printing was in 1806.
A larger volume of 70,000 words was published
in 1828.

In the old-time 1828 dictionary good old Noah
Webster had the habit of going into lengthy dis-
sertations as to the moral implication of the word
mentioned. In mentioning the word “sin” he
would go into & long harangue as to what terrors
face those who commit a sin and how surely their
souls will go straight to hades, now more com-
monly called hell.

PECULIAR MENTAL STOCK
TT IS said that dictators and emperors are of a
* peculiar mental stock — a stock that is chock
full of idiosyncrasies. Take for example, Helio-
gabalus, the extravagant Roman emperor, who had

an addiction for feasting on the tongues of pea-
cocks and nightingales and the brains of parrots
and pheasants. History records that at one ban-
quet he served, in a single dish, the brains of 600
ostriches.

NOT SO MODERN!

/"^HECK appendicitis off your list of modem
diseases based on the “rigors” of civilization
Experts recently examining several ancient Egyp-
tian mummies discovered that the deceased were
victims of the malady.

TRUTH ABOUT BATS
'‘THIS being a magazine of fantasy and some-
times one of somewhat weird tales, it’s only
natural that once in a while our writers portray
bats as the most awful of sinister creatures. Yet
how different from the truth!

During the last 15 years students, cooperating
with the United States Biological Survey, have
been doing a lot to prove that bats spend most
of their life doing other things than getting in
people’s hair. By catching bats, tagging them
with aluminum leg bands and numbers, then set-
ting them free, students have been able to leam
a thing or two. Don Griffin, a Harvard student
of two years ago, banded some 10,000 bats, and to
study their habits he has invaded everything from
abandoned mine shafts and mountain caves to the
hot hay mows of old bams. The results clearly
show that many of our ideas about bats are really
pure hokum.

It has been discovered that some bats winter in
Bermuda and summer in New England; others
hibernate in caves. Most of them possess much the
same homing instinct as pigeons. The female carry
their young beneath their wings, the infants hang-
ing tenaciously onto the maternal fur. And when
you see bats swooping about at night, they are
not hell bent on getting a good parking place in
someone’s hair, but are hunting insects with amaz-
ing expertness. Life being what it is these days,
the comment of a well-known naturalist seems
appropriate: “Bats probably think we’re bats I”

All Heels

Robert Bloch

Jeep had a reputation for being a liar, but there
was something about his story that was convincing;
and besides there was his appetite— and those pills!

I DROPPED into Jack’s place the
other night for a slice of tongue —
some of it in a sandwich and some
from between Jack’s lips. The place
was pretty crowded, but I managed to
find a booth as Jack glided over to
take my order.

“What’ll it be?” he asked. Then —
“Well I’ll be damned!” said Jack.
“Probably,” I observed.

But Jack didn’t hear me. He was
staring at the tall thin man who el-
bowed his way toward the booth.

I stared, too. There was nothing re-
markable about the gentleman’s thin,
somewhat dour face, but his suit was
enough to attract anyone’s attention.

It isn’t often that you see a horse-
blanket walking.

“See that guy?” Jack whispered,
hurriedly. “He’s a number for you.
Used to be an upper bracket in the
rackets.”

“He looks it,” I confided. “Is he
dangerous?”

“No. Reformed, completely re-
formed. Ever since he divorced his
third wife he’s led a simple life, play-
ing the races. But I never expected
to see him in here — he hasn’t been
around for months. Wait — I’ll see If I
can steer him into your booth. You’ll
enjoy it — he’s the biggest liar in seven
states.”

194

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

“What seven?” I asked, in some cu-
riosity. But Jack was signalling the
glum-iaced man in the checkered suit.

“Hello, Leftyl Where in blazes
have you been?”

“Everywhere, and up to my neck,”
said the stranger. “But make with the
menu because at the moment I arrive
by express from hunger.”

“Sit here,” Jack suggested, indicat-
ing my booth. This guy is a friend of
mine.”

Lefty favored me with a long look.
“Is he a righto or a wrongo?” he
asked.

“He’s a writer,” said Jack. “Bob, I
want you to meet a friend of mine —
Lefty Feep.”

“A pleasure,” I said.

Lefty sat down without a word and
grabbed the menu from Jack’s hands.

“Shoot the steak to me Jack,” he
said. “Also I will have bean soup, clam
chowder, a double order mashed pota-
toes, peas, carrots, roast chicken, a
ham on rye, baked beans, an order of
waffles, asparagus, pork tenderloin,
scrambled eggs, coffee, apple pie, ice
cream, and watermelon.”

“You kidding?"

“No — eating. Now bring it here,
but fast. My stomach is empty so long
I think it’s haunted.”

Jack shrugged and moved away, mut-
tering the incredible order under his
breath.

Lefty Feep turned to me suddenly
with a scowl.

“Vitaminsl” he grated. “Vitamins!”
“You need them?” I asked.

“I hate vitamins,” said Lefty. “Give
me food any time.”

“What’s the matter, been on a diet?”
“You speak a mean truth, all right.
For a week now I partake of nothing
but vitamins. I am going pill-wacky.”
Lefty sighed heavily. “B’-bugs,” he
mumbled. “D-dizzy.”

“Doctor’s orders?” I inquired.

“No. Restaurant orders. It’s all I
can get. Will you live in a burg where
nobody nibbles anything but pills?”

“What town is this you're speaking
of?”

“New York.”

“But there’s plenty of food in New
York — ” I began.

“There is and there isn’t,” said Lefty,
darkly brooding. “There is now but
there will be ain’t.”

“I don’t get it.”

“I figure you don’t. Nobody will.
I can make with the explanations but
it is not such a thing as anyone will
believe and I do not wish to get the
reputation of a guy who sniffs snow.”

“You’re no drug addict,” I said.
“Come on, spill It.”

Lefty Feep looked at me again with
a wry smile. He shrugged.

“You asked for it,” he said. “It is a
story that will make your hair curdle
and your blood stand on end.”

“Shoot,” I urged.

He shot.

* * *

“T AST week I am coming back from
Buffalo where I wager a few pen-
nies on the bow-wows. My pooch
comes in and I make collections, so I
drive back very happy. It is the first
time I make money by going to the
dogs.”

“More and over, I know I have five
rancho grandos waiting for me in Man-
hattan, where I place another bet with
a personality name of Gorilla Gabface.

“This Gorilla Gabface is a number I
dearly love to hate. He is a big noise
in the rackets, and I do not care to
have dealings with such riff and raff.
Our association is just sentimental, be-
cause he and I once work our way
through reform school together selling

TIME WOUNDS ALL HEELS

195

alky.

“But while I get reformed, Gorilla
merely gets more and more unscrupu-
lous in his business deals, until he is
left with not one single scruple at all.

I do all right, but he is always poking
from fun at me, saying the only gold
I will ever see will be in a halo, while
he has enough gold for a complete set
of teeth.

“So I am very hepped over winning
this little wager, like I say, and I start
driving back thinking about how I will
hand him the old razz and he will hand
me the old cash and it will be a very
fair exchange.

“Along about noon a.m. I find myself
in the mountain country, and I am so
happy I start to yodel while I drive.
In fact, I even open the car window a
trifle to sniff some air, which is unusual
for me, because I have a theory that
air is not so healthy on guys if it is too
fresh.

“But the hills are very pretty, and
the road has more curves than a Min-
sky stripper, and the sun is shining,
and the birds are singing, and it is just
one great big popular song if you know
what I mean. I feel like a character
on the Alka-Seltzer Barn Dance.

“I am too happy to notice where I’m
going, so it is no wonder at all that I
snap out of it to find myself off on a
side road going up a hill.

“I figure on turning around when
I reach the top, so I keep driving up
and over. But the hill does not seem
to have any top to it — -I just keep on
twisting and turning, and all the time
the road is getting dustier and smaller,
and the woods on each side are as thick
as a House of David beard.

“It is so uncivilized I do not even
spot a gas station. For that matter, I
no longer see any farm houses or cat-
alogue cabins. I wonder about this
more than slightly, but keep on driving.

The air is blue up there, and so am I,
because I figure I am lost for sure un-
less I get a chance to turn around.

“ r T''HEN all at once I come to a level
grade that goes off for quite a
space into a little valley between the
hills. I am just ready to wheel around
when I notice the sign.

“It is on the side of the road just
ahead, standing on a stick between
some rocks. I am curious to see what
kind of advertising goes over here in
the provinces, so I pull up and read it.
It says:

PICNIC TODAY

DIMINUTIVE SOCIETY OF

THE CATSKILL MOUNTAINS

FREE ENTERTAINMENT AND
REFRESHMENTS.
STRANGERS WELCOME

“I suddenly realize I am panging
from hunger, not having taken in
groceries yet today. And here is free
refreshments, so what can I lose? I
never hear of the Diminutive Society
of the Catskill Mountains before, but
I figure they never hear of me either,
so it’s even.

“Before you can say Jack Dempsey,
I make up my mind to drive on in,
which I do. The road is just a little
trail now, but I can make it if I go
slow between the rocks.

“All at once I look up at the sky,
because I hear thunder. The sky is
still blue, and the sun is shining, so I
figure I make a mistake. But no, I
get a little further, and the thunder is
louder.

“Then I round the last bend in the
road and come out on an open space,
and I see what is making with the
thunder. There is an outdoor bowling
alley, so help me, and the noise is from

196

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

the balls rolling along the rocks.

“But that is not what makes me
turn off the ignition and sit there like
somebody stuffed a watermelon in my
mouth. I am staring at the bowlers.

“Now I am a personality who gets
around considerable for many’s the
year. I have the pleasure of placing
my peepers on a lot of screwy spec-
tacles, including pink elephants. But
never do I see a wormier looking sight
than this.

“Because the bowlers at this picnic
are a bunch of dwarfs. So help me,
there are a couple dozen of them, little
shorty guys in nightcaps and ski suits,
all running around like fugitives from
Walt Disney.

“This baffles me but plenty. Be-
cause the sign says this is a picnic
for the Diminutive Society, and instead
of seeing Diminutives, there are these
dwarfs.

“P' IN ALLY I figure it is some kind
of circus brawl or publicity stunt,
though I don’t notice any Pathe news-
reel cameras. What I do notice is the
nice collection of beer kegs off on one
side.

“I sit there and watch the pint-size
Hank Marinos knock off the tenpins
for some minutes. And then, all of a
sudden, I hear a scratching at the side
of the car. ‘Aha, termites 1’ I say to
myself.

“But when I open the door I do not
see any termite. Instead, the smallest
guy in the world is standing on the
running board, trying to reach the door
handle.

“He has a long gray beard on his
face and a short beer in his hand. ‘Wel-
come, stranger,’ he pipes up, in no
voice at all. ‘Welcome to the Diminu-
tive Society of the Catskills.’ I do
not altogether understand this, but
what he says next shows me his heart

is in the right place. ‘Have a drink,’
he says.

“So J. climb out and take the mug
from him. The beer is plenty good,
and has more kick than a chorus girl
with her costume on fire. ‘Little man,
what now?’ I ask.

“He grins through his chin-spinach.
‘What gives out here?’ I inquire. ‘Make
with the explanations.’

“He shrugs. ‘We do not entertain
visitors very often, I fear,’ he pipes.
‘I fear I fail to comprehend your mean-
ing.’

“By this time a whole crowd of
shorty guys are standing around watch-
ing and poking each other. I begin
to feel like I was back in school the
time I was 16 and in the Third Grade.
Most of these babies couldn’t pick my
pocket without using a stepladder.

“So I turn around to the head
squeaker again and try to make him
understand, because I can see from
what he says that he can’t be any too
bright.

“ ‘Listen, quaint-face,’ I say, po-
litely. ‘Where’s Snow-White?’

“This does not go over. Evidently
these jerks cannot even understand
English.

“ ‘I mean, what’s the score? Which
one of you is Dopey? What is this —
a convention of Midget Auto Racers?’

“The head little guy smiles again.
‘You don’t seem to understand at all,’
he tells me. ‘This is the annual picnic
of the Diminutive Society of the Cats-
kill Mountains. It is the one occasion
each year when we venture forth from
our homes to celebrate our ownership
of these hills. We bowl, we drink, we
make merry from sunup to sundown.
It has been a long time, as I say, since
the last stranger’s arrival. May we
welcome you?’

“I don’t get it at all. There is some-
thing awfully queer about this whole

TIME WOUNDS ALL HEELS

197

setup. The way these little guys dress,
and talk, and giggle. But what have
I got to lose? They are too small to
hurt me, and I don’t see any equalizers
in the mob. They are kind of drunk
and out for a good time so why
shouldn’t I stick around for a few
drinks and a few laughs? Maybe it
is the mountain air that does it, or
maybe it is the first beer on an empty
stomach. Anyhow, I shake hands with
the head midget and say, ‘Thanks,
Shorty. How’s for a little bowling?’

“CO then it begins. I take a turn at
the alleys and I take a turn at the
beers. These small fry have special
bowling balls made up to fit their hands
— about the size of tennis balls and
not much heavier. I fling them two at
a time, to be fair.

“These small fry also have special
beer mugs made up to fit their mouths.
So I drink three or four at a time, also
to be fair.

“Pretty soon I turn out to be not
only fair but also quite stinkaroo.
These local yokels brew a mean beer,
and before I notice it I am quite dizzy.
The dwarfs do not seem to notice,
either, but keep right on setting up the
pins and the drinks, and I keep right
on knocking them down.

“I am a nasty hand at the old strike-
and-spare, even though the ground is
rough, and they stand around cheering
me on while I polish off one bowler
after another, also one beer after an-
other.

“Perhaps I am telling this kind of
confused — but that’s the way I get, all
right.

“It only seems like minutes, but it
must be hours, when I glance over my
shoulder and see the old sun is going
down. I have killed the whole after-
noon at this picnic.

“The dwarfs also seem to keep track

of the time, because all of a sudden
they quiet down and get ready to take
a last drink. Nothing will do but for
me to drink with them. And on ac-
count of there being two dozen of them,
I have a lot of drinking to do.

“The head shorty keeps staring at
me and nudging his pals while he
watches me inhale the brew.- ‘Verily,
he has a greater capacity than Master
Van Winkle,’ he giggles.

“The name seems to penetrate the
speckled fog in my noggin for a min-
ute. ‘What’s this about Van Winkle?’
I ask.

“But the sun is very low and red,
and it is dark all around, and I see
the dwarfs suddenly start running
across the bowling lawn and into the
shadows. The head shorty runs after
them. ‘We must leave you, stranger,’
he calls over his shoulder. ‘Pleasant
dreams.’

“I start to run after him, but all
at once I stumble on the grass and
everything starts going round and
round — ten little red suns juggle them-
selves in my head, and the ground
comes up and I am out.

“Just before I close my eyes I man-
age to holler after the last little runt
again. ‘Who is this Van Winkle?’ I
gasp.

“I can not be sure, because I am
going down for the third time, but I
think I hear his voice come from far
away. ‘Why, Master Rip Van Winkle,
of course,’ whispers the dwarf.

“I open my mouth to say something,
but the only thing coming out is a
snore.

r \X/’HEN I open my beautiful baby
blue eyes again, it is daylight.
At first I do not remember where I am,
but then it all comes back in a hurry
and I realize I pass out and probably
sleep the night here.

198

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

“I raise up on one elbow to see if my
little friends are around, but there are
no signs. In fact, to make it funny,
there is not even any bowling lawn, or
tenpins, or tennis-size bowling balls.
To make it not so funny, there is no
beer keg, either— and I have a thirst,
but strong.

“Maybe it is all a dream, I figure.
Then I turn my head and I begin to
pray it is a dream.

“ Because I am now staring at the
car, parked off to one side. And what
I see is not altogether a sight for sore
eyes like mine.

“Yesterday I leave a nice new coupe
standing there. Today I find a jallopy
you couldn’t trade in on a pair of roller
skates. It is covered with rust an inch
thick; the tires are down, and the win-
dows are out.

“I get up in a hurry because it is all
clear to me now. These dwarfs I drink
with are nothing but a gang of car
thieves. They slip me a Mickey Finn
and steal my coupe, leaving me this
broken down wheelbarrow just to be
quaint. No' wonder they treat me so
well — they are nothing but a bunch of
Dead End Kids in whiskers!

“I run over to the wreck and wrench
open the door. It not only opens but
comes off in my hand.

“Then I reach inside, and all at once
something flies out and hits me in the
face. A couple of bats — so help me!

“I stare down at the cobwebs on the
seat. Then I go around in front and
stare again. This time I nearly fall
down.

“Because I see my license plates on
this jallopy!

“There is something wrong here.
This is my car, all right — but . . .
But? I reach' up to scratch my chin.
My hand never gets there. It tangles
up in something soft, like a fur coat.

“My hand is tangled in a beard. A

white beard. My beard! At least it
is growing on me, so it must be my
beard, though I do not want such a
thing. No, I do not want such a thing
as this beard at all, because it is all
tangled up with burrs and thistles.

“I look down at my clothes and that
is the last straw. You could even say
that is the last shred. Because there
isn’t much left of my clothes except
shreds. My trousers .have got French
cuffs made of rags. The moths have
been holding a convention on my knees.
My coat and vest look like something
a goat would eat for dessert.

“T AM not sitting in the hot seat at
the moment, but I am still plenty
shocked.

“Here I am, lost in the mountains,
with an old car and a new beard. It is
enough to make a guy holler — so I do.
I kind of lose my head and run around
yelling for the dwarfs to come out and
make with the explanations. I guess
I am off the beam for several moments,
just screeching there, when I hear a
sound.

“It is a buzzing sound, and it gets
louder. All at once I look up and see
a plane. The plane circles around,
comes lower, and taxis down right in
the open space where the bowling green
should be.

“I just gawk. It is a new model
plane, very small; all silvery and shin-
ing. What makes me gawk is the fact
that it lands in just about a minute, and
it only taxis maybe a hundred feet.

“I do not have much time to gawk,
because a gii^ climbs out of the door
and steps over to me. ‘Anything
wrong?’ he asks me.

“ ‘Yeah,’ I reply. ‘You are.’ And
he is.

“He is wearing a pretty funny getup
himself — a pair of overalls with long
sleeves and lapels on top. Instead of a

TIME WOUNDS ALL HEELS

199

hat he has a kind of basin on his head
that looks like a helmet with antennae
sticking up.

“ ‘Who are you?’ I say, kind of sad.
‘And if you tell me you’re Flash Gor-
don, you can lock me up.’

“He just grins. ‘My name is Grant,’
he says. ‘Special investigator for the
government. What might your name
be?’

“ ‘It might be Old Man Mose, from
the looks of things/ I tell him. ‘But it
isn’t. I’m on my way to New York,
but I run into a little difficulty.’

“ ‘You mean to say an old man like
you intends to walk all the way to New
York?’ he says. ‘No wonder you are
yelling. Would you like a lift? — I’ll
be hitting New York in about half an
hour.’

“ ‘I’m with you, brother/ I say. So
we hop in the plane. I do not look
back at the car again, and for some
reason I do not wish to look down at
myself, either. Still and all I have to
make a crack. ‘Who are you calling an
old man?’ I yap.

“He grins again. ‘Why you, of
course. You’re every bit of 60, aren’t
you? And with a beard, too — I haven’t
seen one of those things in years.’

“This shuts me up as we take off.
‘You are quite a hot sketch yourself/ I
tell him. ‘What are you doing with that
thunder mug on your head?’

“Grant looks at me like I am stir-
simple. ‘Why that’s the radio control
helmet for the plane, of course. Don’t
you know planes are operated by radio
adjustment?’ he asks, turning the an-
tennae on top of the basin and making
the plane rise. ‘Say, how far in the
backwoods do you come from?’

“ ‘Brother, I wish I knew/ I answer.
“ ‘You know, there’s something fun-
ny about you/ he goes on. ‘Those
clothes you’re wearing — they aren’t ex-
actly 1962 cut.’

“‘1962?’ I yell.

“Grant gives me a long look. ‘Of,
course. Don’t tell me you don’t know
what date it is?’

“ ‘Why, April 30th, 1942/ I snap
back.

“ J-TE BEGINS to laugh. Somehow I
do not like to hear him laugh be-
cause I am not on the Bob Hope pro-
gram at the time. ‘This is April 28th,
1962/ he tells me. ‘You are just 20
years and 363 days off. Or maybe
you’re further off than that.’

“ ‘I think so myself/ I say. ‘Because
I lay me down to sleep just last night,
and if it is not 1942 at the time, I am
robbed when I buy a newspaper.’

“ ‘Are you kidding me?’ asks this
Grant.

“ ‘Somebody is kidding somebody/ I
tell him. ‘All I know is I hoist a few
beers with a gang of dwarfs on a picnic
and fall asleep. When I wake up my
car is rusty, my suit is a ragpicker’s de-
light, and I have long white whiskers.
Which is hard to figure out, because I
am really a young guy with a sporty
car and a nifty checkered suit. And if
I’m not the guy who has the beard,
then who the hell am I?’

“ ‘You sound like Rip Van Winkle
to me/ laughs Grant.

“I pick up my ears. ‘Rip Van
Winkle ! ’ I yell. ‘That’s the bozo the
head dwarf mentions to me just before
I hit the hay. Who is he?’

“So this Grant guy tells me a story
about some jerk who lives way back
when and gets lost in the mountains
like I do. He meets up with a troupe
of Singer’s Midgets or somebody and
starts bowling and drinking. They slip
him some knockout drops and he goes
out for the count. In fact he has such
a hangover he sleeps for twenty years.
At least that is the line he hands his
wife when he gets back home.

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

“ ‘That sounds like me, all right/ I
decide. ‘So I do a twenty-year stretch
on the grass. Well, there are worse
places. But I see where I am plenty
behind on current events. What do
you hear from the mob?’

“This Grant guy doesn't know
whether to take me serious or not, ‘You
actually claim an experience like Rip
Van Winkle's?’

“ ‘I do not make up such a line just
to explain to my wife/ I say. ‘Because
at the moment I do not have a wife,
only alimony expenses. And after
twenty years I wager I do not even have
to pay alimony. But make with the
news broadcast, buddy. What goes on
in the world? Who wings the Series
last year? Are they still running the
nags at Saratoga and wherever? Is
Joe Louis still champion? Give out
with important stuff like that.’

“Grant’s face falls about a foot. ‘I’m
afraid the world isn’t in such good
shape/ he tells me.

“ ‘You mean the New Deal hasn’t
cleaned things up yet?* I ask.

“ ‘No, not exactly. Things are a lot
better now, nationally and internation-
ally, I suppose. You’ll find plenty of
new customs and fashions current, and
a lot of inventions and improvements
over your time. But one problem still
remains. And it’s a problem that’s
baffling me in my work right now.’

“T ASK him what it is.

“ ‘Crime/ he tells me. ‘Boot-
legging. Right now I’m investigating
the biggest bootlegging racket this
country has ever seen.’

“ ‘What’s the matter, is Prohibition
in again?’ I ask.

“ ‘Prohibition? Oh — no, it’s not liq-
uor that’s being bootlegged. It’s vita-
mins.’

“ ‘Vitamins? You mean that alpha-
bet stuff — like A,B,C,D? I never go

for such articles personally. Give me
a beefsteak rare any time.’

“ ‘You don’t understand at all/
Grant tells me. ‘Vitamins are food
now. Today we eat only vitamin pills.
Scientific research has perfected vita-
min sources of energy and nourishment
during the past years, largely as a re-
sult of crop shortages and famine fol-
lowing the second world war. Now
everyone takes a daily ration of vita-
mins. It’s improving the stamina of
the world’s population. But lately large
stores of synthetic vitamin capsules are
being stolen — hijacked, you’d call it
— from the government warehouses.
Women and children are starving again
in a world where we have no place for
hunger and want any more. Some or-
ganized group of vandals is stealing
capsules and bootlegging them to mer-
chants. And since all vitamin produc-
tion is centered at New York, and most
of the capsules are stored there before
distribution, the situation is grave. For
weeks now, millions of capsules dis-
appear daily. And people go hungry.

“‘Iam on my way back to New York
from Cleveland. My clues there prove
to be false leads. But unless I can
crack this mess soon, it’s all up with
me.’ Grant admits this sourly.

“ ‘I am an old alky runner myself/
I tell him. ‘Maybe when I get into
town I will look up some of the old
mob and see if there are any leads. If
so, I will give you a buzz. How about
the phone number?’

“ ‘Use the private shortwave sys-
tem/ he says. ‘You’ll find sending sets
wherever you go. But you’re not leav-
ing me — I want to hear more about this
Rip Van Winkle yarn.’

‘I got business in the city. But
urgent. I will contact you later/ I
promise.

“He doesn’t answer. He is fiddling
with his headpiece again, making a

TIME WOUNDS ALL HEELS

201

landing. Because before I realize it,
we are already over New York. I look
out. The burg is not much changed.
The buildings look a little taller, but I
still see the Empire State and Radio
City, and I think I spot Minsky’s as
we circle down.

“We land just outside Flushing, in
another little field. The air around us
is filled with little silver specks — more
planes. In. fact we come down in a
place that says:

PLANES PARKED— 50c
OVERNIGHT HANGARS— 75c
MOTOR TUNEUP — $1 .00

“And a guy comes running out to
wipe off the windshield. I duck out of
the seat in a hurry, and head for the
gate. There is a subway entrance
about a block away.

“ ‘Hey, wait for me!’ yells this Grant
guy. ‘I want to ’talk to you.’

“ ‘See you later,’ I call back. ‘I may
be a little slow getting there, but I still
got a five grand bet to collect from
Gorilla Gabface.’

“SPHERE is a lot I could tell. About
A the rocket subway they put in in-
stead of the old one — all new improve-
ments, except that I -still have to stand
up. About the screwy way they dress,
in these overalls with the lapels, and
about the new type cars I see downtown
that operate with these radio controls
but still try to get every pedestrian who
steps off the sidewalk. I notice tele-
vision movie houses, too, and I kind of
get to wondering what happens to the
oldfashioned strip-tease, but I do not
have time to find out.

“Because, like I tell this Grant, I am
on my way to see Gorilla Gabface. In
1942 he hangs out behind a pool hall
on Second Avenue, and I figure it is an
even chance he is still there, because

Gorilla is not the kind of character who
gets around much. In fact he is very
lazy and hardly ever moves from his
chair except to kick his wife.

“So I get off the subway and start
walking. The streets look no better;
in fact twenty years age them the way
they age me.

“On the subway persons look at me
kind of peculiar and I am undoubtedly
a sight, but here on Second Avenue I
look quite natural — because the street
is full of broken down bums.

“I get to thinking about that. I am
a broken down old bum myself, now,
and I hardly know what to do. But I
figure once I get my hands on that five
grand I will shave and dress and look
around for some odds on the dogs or
nags, and get back on my feet.

“Still and all it is not pleasant to
hike along. Because there are a lot of
sad-looking people on the street, sitting
in front of their houses. Kids crying,
and women with shawls around their
heads, and guys sitting with their heads
in their hands.

“Pretty soon I come to a long line of
guys standing in front of a store. They
are mumbling and double-talking under
their breath. Up at the head of the line
they are pushing and rattling the door
to the joint, which is locked.

“All at once a guy sticks his head out
of the window upstairs. ‘Go away,’ he
says. ‘Go away, all of you. Govern-
ment orders. We can’t sell any cap-
sules today— vitamin shortage.’

“Guys in the line let out a groan.
‘What about my family?’ one yells. ‘My
old lady and the baby have nothing to
eat for three days now, except a few
capsules of C and half an ounce of E.’

“ ‘I’m sorry,’ says the guy in the win-
dow. ‘You know how it is. I’m not
responsible.’

“ ‘We got to eat,’ says the fellow in
the line. ‘It’s those damned hijackers 1

202

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

Why don’t they catch them?’

“JyTOST of the men turn away. I
walk on. All at on once I notice
a little rat-face personality sneaking up
to one of the guys in the line.

“ ‘You want some capsules, buddy?’
he whispers. ‘I got some here — nice
fresh stuff. A to Z, anything you want,
if you’ll keep your mouth shut.’

“The guy looks at rat-face kind of
funny, but he says, ‘I suppose I have
to. My folks are hungry. How much
for a two-day supply of general ra-
tions?’

“Rat-face smiles. ‘Ten bucks/ he
says.

“‘Ten bucks? Why that’s robbery
— these capsules are only 80c at a regu-
lar store 1’ says the guy.

“Rat-face smiles again. ‘Regular
store hasn’t got any/ he whispers. ‘You
know that. Ten bucks, buddy. You’re
lucky to get it.’

“The guy hands him the money and
gets a little tube. I don’t wait to see
any more, but I know rat-face is going
down the line now.

“I understand what this guy Grant
tells me on the plane, about the vitamin
shortage. It’s just like bootlegging-
only with a difference. Because, you
see, these people need food. They must
have it. And to hi-jack this stuff and
then sell it — -well, I don’t go for it,
that’s all. Maybe I am getting soft in
my old age.

“Anyhow, I do not think about it any
more, because I arrive at Gorilla’s pool
hall and walk in. The joint looks just
the same, and it is just as empty out
front. There is only one guy sitting
there — a new guy to me. He has a red
face with a lot of warts growing on it,
and there is a dead cigarette butt in
his mouth. A collar ad boy.

“ ‘Hello, character/ I greet him. ‘Is
Gorilla around?’

“Warty gives me a slow look. ‘He
might be. Who’s looking for him?’

“ ‘Tell him Lefty Feep wants to see
him. It’s about five grand.’

“ ‘You got five grand?’

“ ‘I’m going to get five grand from
him/ I correct.

“He gives me the old leer and sneer.
But I stare right back, and finally he
climbs off the stool and goes into the
rear room. He returns in a couple min-
utes.

“ ‘Go right in/ he says.

“So I toddle back and open the door.

“ ‘Well, pappy?’ says a voice.

“I see a big fat guy sitting at a table.
He has a bald noggin and a couple
spare chins, but mostly he is all jaw
from the neck up and all arms from the
neck down. He looks like King Kong
with a bad shave.

“ ‘Pardon me, curly/ I state.
‘Where could I find Gorilla Gab face?’

“ ‘In hell/ says the fat guy at the
table. ‘He’s been dead for eighteen
years. Come to think of it you don’t
look far from dead yourself, pappy.’

“ ‘Don’t call me pappy!’ I snap. ‘Or
I will let the air out of your chins, you
overgrown walrus.’

“npHEN the fat guy gets up from the

A table and I see he is about ten feet
tall, or maybe six and a half anyhow.
Part of him is muscle and the rest is
meanness, so when he laughs I am not
fooled, and when he sticks out his mitt
I do not clasp it in any fraternity grip.

“ ‘Who are you and what do you
want?’ he says, moving around toward
me.

“ ‘I am Lefty Feep, and Gorilla Gab-
face owes me five Gs on the dog-races/

I repeat, stubborn. Only my feet are
not stubborn, because they back me to
the door.

“ ‘Well I am Gorilla’s nephew and I
am running this show now for many’s

TIME WOUNDS ALL HEELS

203

the year. I do not ever hear my uncle
mention your name, and he certainly
never mentions owing anyone five pen-
nies, let alone five grand. So my advice
to you, Feep, is to get out of here before
I strangle you in your whiskers, you old
sponge!’

‘“I take it you do not wish to pay
me?’ I inquire, just to make sure.

“The fat guy reaches out across the
floor with one hand, which wraps
around my neck. ‘No,’ he says, lifting
me off the floor and shaking me like a
used bar-rag. ‘Though I can see you
have a good use for five thousand dol-
lars, if only to pay hospital expenses
after I get through beating you up.’

“This is not exactly good news to me,
and it is even less good when he smacks
me one on the side of the head. I am
just hanging there helpless while the
fat guy draws back for another clout,
when all at once he drops me to the
floor.

“Another guy comes in behind me,
and he attracts the fat guy’s attention.
I lie there on the floor looking up and
I see the newcomer is none other than
Rat-face, the slug that was selling boot-
leg vitamin capsules to the citizens in
front of the market.

“He is so excited he does not even
notice me ; and nearly steps on my face
while I am lying there. ‘It’s going
great, Boss!’ he yells to the fat guy. ‘I
sell three hundred bucks of pills in the
last hour. The rest of the mob is cov-
ering the district. We are running out
of stock.’

“ID AT-FACE is still talking when
Wart-face comes in from the
front room. He has an acetylene torch
in one hand. ‘The boys are ready to
tunnel through to the Government
warehouse again this evening,’ he says.
‘Shall I send the trucks over?’

“Fat guy looks at the two of them

kind of funny. ‘You birds talk too
much,’ he says. ‘Here,’ he says to Rat-
face. ‘Go back out and tell the mob
to stop selling for today. We don’t
want to flood the market all at once.’
Then he turns to Wart-face. ‘Get down
-to the warehouse. The boys are tun-
neling through from the building along-
side. But leave this torch with me. I
think I got to use it. Now— -powder! ’
“The two guys back out of the room
without even noticing me. I am lying
on the floor listening to the birdies from
that crack on the head, but I am also
thinking. If these guys are the ones
Grant is after, they have been running
this bootleg vitamin racket from this
place. One gang must be tunneling
through to steal Government supplies,
and the other gang goes out and sells
the pills. And this fat guy is the brain.

“So there I am, locked in a room
with Gorilla’s nephew. I am sixty years
old, I have no equalizer, and he is a
pretty tough customer.

“What he has to say to me is not en-
couraging, either. He stands over me
and looks down with a very nasty grin.
‘I am sorry about you, pappy,’ he says.
‘I only intend to beat you up and send
you to a hospital. But now you hear a
little too much, so I think your next
stop is the morgue.’

“I think in high gear. ‘Have a heart,’
I tell him. ‘I am an oldtimer myself. I
know your late uncle, in fact I am as-
sociated with him, you might say. I
just do a twenty-year stretch, but I am
an uptown boy. I can help you plenty.’
“Fat guy stands right over me and
laughs some more. ‘No use, pappy,’
he says. ‘You old-fashioned gangsters
are all through. We don’t use rods and
rattlers a uy more. This is big business.
I am bucking the Federal Government
myself, and winning. Why, we got
eighty million vitamin food capsules
stored away under this joint, and we’re

204

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

tunneling through tonight for another
thirty million. I got a hundred guys
out organized to cover bootleg terri-
tories. It’s big business. We got a
dozen cities at our mercy. Do you
think I am some cheesy little punk in
back of a poolroom like my late uncle?
Not for a minute — this is big time stuff
and you has-beens are no good.’

“ ‘But give me a chance— I know a
few tricks,’ I plead.

“He turns on the laugh again. ‘Not
on your life,’ he chuckles. ‘And speak-
ing of your life, here goes.’

“So he reaches down for the acety-
lene torch and the interview is over.

“Tj'IFTEEN minutes later, after I lo-
cate this guy Grant by shortwave
from a cigar store on the corner, he
arrives and claps the cuffs on the fat
guy. Also his men surround the pool
hall and snag Rat-face and his pals
when they drift in from time to time.

“They also capture, I hear later, all
the mob down at the tunnel job, and
they find the stores of capsules in a big
cellar warehouse hidden downstairs.

“So all in all it turns out to be a good
thing for this guy Grant. And also for
me, when I learn the Government is
paying a five grand reward for turning
up the vitamin racketeers.

“Two days later the money comes
through. Meanwhile I pal around with
Grant and eat vitamins in restaurants.
That is why I get so sick of them.

“In fact, on the third day I am sitting
in a hamburger stand making faces
while I gulp down my third order of the
dizzy beef pills with a ketchup drop
on the side. Grant is with me, and he
says, ‘Well, what are you going to do
with the reward — go into business for
yourself?’

“That is when I get mad. ‘No,’ I
tell him. ‘I am not cut out for this day
and age, I see that. I am too old to

start in again, I do not like the class of
people that run the rackets nowadays,
and besides I do not see any strip shows
in progress at all. More and over,
these vitamin pills ruin my digestion
and I have not even got an excuse to
carry a toothpick. I think maybe I am
better off back in 1942.’

“ ‘Too bad,’ Grant tells me. ‘Those
days are gone forever.’

“But I do not hear him. I am star-
ing at a calendar on the wall. ‘April
29th!’ I holler. ‘Listen, do you or do
you not tell me I sleep for 20 years and
360 days? And do I or do I not spend
4 more days here? That makes to-
morrow April 30th again!’

“ ‘So what?’ Grant asks.

“ ‘So that means tomorrow is the an-
nual picnic of the Diminutive Society
of the Catskill Mountains. Hop into
that plane of yours — we’re going to see
those dwarfs and give them a little prop-
osition.’

“\X7’HICH is just what we do. Grant
r lets me off near the top of the
mountains the next morning. I go up
and find the dwarfs bowling as usual.
They are surprised to see me, and kind
of embarrassed, till I get the head
shorty off.

“I ask him if he has got anything to
drink that will send me back to where
I was. He plays smart and says no.
Then I tell him that fun is fun, and a
gag is a gag, but I want to go back and
am ready to pay for the trip.

“This gets him interested, and he
asks what the deal is. I tell him. He
gets excited and calls a conference.
Well, to make a long story short, they
get together with me and the head
shorty goes off and mixes up a fresh
drink. Not beer, but something else.
I promise not to mention it. Then I
take care of my end of the bargain and
drink the stuff.

TIME WOUNDS ALL HEELS

205

“It puts me out right away. And
when I wake up everything is O.K. It
is morning and when I hike down the
mountain I find out that it is May 1st,
1942.

“I wire ahead for some funds, and
rush into town. The first place I head
for is here, because after eating nothing
but vitamins for four days, I am plenty
hungry.”

* * *

y EFTY FEEP concluded his story
with a profound sigh. It was fol-
lowed by a snort from over my shoul-
der.

Jack stood there with the tray of
food.

“What did I tell you?” he asked me.
“Did you ever hear such a line in your
life?”

Feep bridled. “What is wrong with
my story, I would like to know?” he
asked.

Jack snorted again. “Everything.
But even if I believed it — which I don't
— there are just a few things that puzzle
me. To begin with, I thought you
were at the mercy of that fat guy in
the back room of the pool hall. He
was going to kill you with an acetylene
torch, wasn’t he? In fact you were
lying there on the floor and he was
standing over you. And yet you say
that fifteen minutes later you walked
out free and left him there to be cap-
tured.”

“Oh, that?” said Lefty Feep. “That
is very simple. Like I say, this guy
thinks he is so smart, and that old-
timers do not know any clever tricks.
But I have one trick up my sleeve he
does not know. It is a very ordinary

trick today and much used in the rack-
ets — but I suppose he never hears of it
in 1962, I am lying there on the floor,
he reaches down for the torch, but I
grab it first. He shoves his foot down
on my arm, but then I pull this old-
fashioned trick on him, like I say. I
merely turn on the torch and give him
the hot-foot. And if you do not think
a hot-foot with a torch is effective, you
are crazy.”

Jack turned crimson. “All right, I
give up,” he sighed. “But just one
thing more. About that deal you made
with the dwarfs.”

“What about it?”

“Well, certainly you didn’t just offer
them money. They have no use for
money.”

Feep smiled. “Of course not. But
I use the money to make the deal. I
buy something the dwarfs will really go
for. That is what I tell the head shorty
to make him go through with it. I tell
him I will give his little pals something
they can use at their picnics from now
on.”

“And what is that?”

“A modern bowling alley. Sure — I
tell him I contract to build a bowling
alley right on top of the mountain, so
they can organize a league and get into
the tournaments. In fact, next year I
am going back there again and play
them myself. Maybe you would like
to get on the team?”

“Come on,” said Jack to me, “Let's
you and I get out of here.”

We left the table, but Feep didn’t
see us go. He was tearing apart the
roast chicken with the famished look of
a man who has eaten nothing but pills
for four days.

COMING! The amazing sequel to “The City Of Lost Souls” by Ralph Milne Farley and A1 P. Nel-
son. Don Warren, lone survivor of the three-thousand of the Legion Of Death who rode into the
Martian desert, goes back to the city of Daloss and finds there the greatest adventure of them all —
and regains a paradise he had thought lost forever I Don’t fail to watch for the coming of this story.
You yourself asked for it l

BERTIE and the BLHCK ARTS

WILLIAM P. McGIVERN

Black arts or not, one thousand tickets to the
big game were worth $50 per— so Bertie sold 'em!

W HEN the Moss wood college
football special rattled to a
stop in the sleepy little depot
on the outskirts of Mosswood, it dis-
gorged some three hundred pennant-
waving, red-faced, drunkenly vocifer-
ous alumni. These blithe spirits
swarmed over the waiting room, shout-
ing to friends, yelling at cab drivers
and in general behaving with the care-
less abandon that is the stamp of
men released from the sober vigilance
of their wives.

Among this carnival of happy souls
Bertie Crimmins stood out like a bea-
con on a dark night. Or like a pro-
fessional pallbearer in the midst of a
New Year’s Eve celebration.

He was a tall, slim young man and,
except for the pleasantly vacant look
on his face he might have been consid-
ered handsome. He stood out in the
crowd because he was wearing his hat
instead of waving it wildly over his
head. Also he was sober. On top of
all this he carried no pennants and was

207

208

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

not pounding someone on the back and
shouting at the top of his voice.

There was, however, a certain wist-
ful light in his eyes, as he surveyed
the antics of his companions. Once,
as the chorus of the Mosswood school
song was being chanted by an inebri-
ated and off-key quartet, his lips began
to move automatically and the song
almost poured forth of its own volition.

As he stood in the center of the depot
looking about expectantly, a chubby,
red-faced chap holding a bottle in one
hand stumbled into him.

“Ssssorry,” he mumbled, swaying
slightly. Then his eyes lighted with
recognition. "My old pal, Bertie Crim-
minsl” he cried emotionally. “X didn’t
know you were coming down for the
ol’ game. Have a drink, pal, have a
drink.”

He shoved the bottle toward Bertie.

Bertie looked at it longingly, but
shook his head.

. “I’m not using the 3tuff,” he said
weakly.

His cock-eyed friend stared at him
with incredulous disbelief.

“You don’t say,” he mumbled in as-
tonishment. “You were the best ol’
rum pot in school when I was here.
Member the time ol’ Prexy caught the
two of us, blind drunk, in the girl’s
dressing room at the Senior Prom?
That was some time, wasn’t it?”

“Y — yes it was,” Bertie said hastily.
He wiped his suddenly damp brow, and
glanced nervously about the depot.

“You know sumpn’,” his drunken
chum tittered, “I always wondered
what ol’ Prexy was doing there, him-
self.”

In spite of conscience, Bertie found
himself warming to the subject.

“Was odd, wasn’t it?” he said. “Do
you suppose the old bounder — ”

“Hello, Bertrand,” a soft voice beside
him said.

DERTIE froze in mid-sentence. At
his side was a slim, lovely blonde
girl with deep blue eyes. There was
just a touch of frost in those lovely
eyes now.

“Darling,” Bertie cried nervously.
“You’re looking wonderful. Positively
radiant. Let’s go outside. Out in the
clean, fresh air. Away from these — er
— gross people.”

He turned to the chubby drunk and
said firmly,

“There are no more trains arriving
today, my good man. That’s all you
wanted to know, is it not?”

Without waiting for an answer, he
grabbed the lovely blonde girl by the
arm and towed her out of the depot
into the fresh air.

There he breathed deeply, not for
health’s sake, but from sheer relief.

Ann Turner, the lovely blonde girl,
regarded him dubiously.

“Bertie, dear,” she said, “you haven’t
broken any of your promises have
you?”

“Silly girl,” Bertie laughed. “I have
been the epitome of respectability these
last two months.”

“No drinking?”

“Not a drop.”

“Poker?”

“Certainly not.”

“Horses?”

“My dear little cherub, I haven’t
even nodded to a milkman’s horse.
That should prove that I can be the
steady, reliable type, what?”

Bertie Crimmins’ problem was not a
new one. In college he had been a
happy, care-free soul and the stigma
of his undergraduate days had a nasty
way of sticking to him. When he had
met The Girl, it turned out that she
had heard of his primrosy path and,
as a result, was dubious about the
double harness idea he had suggested
one moonlight night. So he had been

BERTIE AND THE BLACK ARTS

209

put on probation and, to his credit, he
had survived the ordeal manfully.

“You do look different,” Ann said
thoughtfully. “You have a very re-
spectable look in your eyes.”

Inwardly, Bertie sighed. He had
slipped far if his stare at a luscious
girl could be described as respectable.
But he said:

“Right you are. Babbit Bertie, they
call me. Now will you marry me?”
“What will we live on?” Ann asked
practically.

T)ERTIE almost swooned with de-
^ light at this time-honored question.
For it meant that The Girl was prac-
tically in his arms for keeps.

“A sensible question,” he said ap-
provingly. “But you may cease wor-
rying on that score. My brother, who
is a good enough chap in his way, con-
trols the purse strings of the Crimmins
estates. The foolish chap cares noth-
ing for money himself, but he has re-
fused to pass along any of the bonny
green stuff to me. You see he hasn’t
much confidence in me. But when he
sees the remarkable transformation I
have undergone, he will give me his
blessings and large chunks of lettuce
with which we can furnish our nest.”
“Where is your brother?”

“Right here at Mosswood. He’s as-
sistant professor of almost forgotten
languages, or something like that. Odd,
what?”

“Will you see him today?”

“First thing,” Bertie answered cheer-
fully. “I’ll drop you home and then
speed the body over to his rooms to
show him what a sterling chap I’ve
turned into.”

He waved for a cab.

A half hour later Bertie stepped from
the cab, a feeling of virtuous confidence
in his heart. He had dropped Ann off
a few minutes before and her farewell

had been affectionately tender. It was
obvious that she was impressed by the
New Bertie.

Bertie paid off the driver with his
last remaining change and headed up
the elm-lined walk that led to the un-
pretentiously dignified house where his
brother lived and labored.

There was a song in his heart and a
bounce in his stride as he trotted up
the steps and punched the doorbell.
His brother’s housekeeper opened the
door and after murmuring “speak of
the devil” or something equally cheery,
admitted him.

She led the way to his brother’s study
in a grim silence. She did not approve
of Bertie Crimmins interrupting his
brother in the middle of his work. She
paused before an oak -paneled door.

“Mister Arthur is very -busy these
days,” she said coldly. “I hope you
will not disturb him too ynuch.”

“Oh, I won’t,” Bertie said warmly.
“I’ll only be here for the week-end.”

“Only? Couldn’t you manage to
stay a full week?”

Sarcasm was lost on Bertie.

“Nice of you,” he said brightly, “but
it just can’t be done. Sorry and all
that.”

'\X7'ITH a warm feeling of being in
demand he opened the oak-pan-
eled door and strode into his brother’s
study.

“What hoi” he cried.

His brother, a lean scholarly looking
chap, with graying temples and horn-
rimmed glasses, looked up from his
desk where he had been intently ex-
amining a faded piece of parchment.

There was a distinct trace of annoy-
ance in his tired blue eyes.

“Must you bellow?” he said impa-
tiently.

“Sorry,” Bertie said. “Didn’t realize
the old vocal chords had that much vim

210

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

and vigor. Must be the old brotherly
affection cropping out.”

“Stop babbling,” his brother said.
“Come in and close the door. Fm busy
here. Be through in a moment. Sit
down.”

“Right hoi” Bertie said. “Don’t let
me disturb the great brain. Let it
ramble on. I’ll sit and watch.”

“In silence,” his brother qualified.

Bertie found a comfortable chair and
threw his lean body over it in a posi-
tion that a professional contortionist
might have envied. His brother had
turned back to his desk, his head bent
close to the ancient parchment. He
only changed his position to turn the
pages of a huge leather bound book
resting on the desk beside him.

Bertie gazed about at the book lined
walls and sighed. It didn’t hardly seem
decent to give a million dollars to a
buzzard who spent his waking hours
digging into the remains of obscure
authors.

He was disturbed by an exultant ex-
clamation from his brother.

“Got a nibble?” he asked compan-
ionably.

His brother’s thin frame was trem-
bling with excitement.

“If,” he muttered tensely, “I can
prove a relationship between the recur-
rence of this symbol and the recurrence
of the letter V in the Phoenician al-
phabet, I^may have something.”

“Probably alphabet soup,” Bertie
said brightly. “Get it! Letter ‘e’
mixed up with something else and you
get alphabet soup. It’s a joke, what?”

His brother turned to him, the scien-
tific zeal in his eyes fading slowly.

“Bertie,” he said slowly, “you are a
blithering moron. On top of that — ”

“Tut! tut!” Bertie said hastily.
“Mustn’t forget the old brotherly af-
fection.”

“You make it easy to,” his brother

said sadly.

“It’s nice of you to say so,” Bertie
beamed. “Now I’ve a surprise for you.
I’m getting married. Congratulate
me.”

“Married?” his brother said sharply.

“Right hoi It’s a blow, but you
must be strong. You’re not losing a
brother, you know, you’re gaining a
sister.”

TJTIS brother lighted a pipe carefully

A and peered over the flame at Ber-
tie as one might at an amiable nit wit.

“What are you going to live on?” he
asked.

“Glad you brought that up, old
bean,” Bertie said. “We’ll be needing
a spot of assistance and I thought that
you might bless the union with a hearty
hunk of the old necessary.”

“Translated, that means I am to
finance your marriage?”

“Crudely put, but accurate,” Bertie
admitted.

“I shall do no such thing. In my
opinion you are about as competent
to handle money as a two-months-old
baby. The bulk of the family estate
will revert to you when I think you
are capable of handling it intelligently.
That date, I regret to say, does not
seem imminent.”

“You mean,” Bertie said glumly,
“that it’s no soap.”

“I mean precisely that.”

“But I’m a new man,” Bertie said
frantically. “Old salt of the earth,
backbone of the Nation. No more of
the cup that cheers, no more of the
gay race tracks. All over, all done
with.”

His brother looked at him skepti-
cally.

“In the vernacular, I am from the
state of Missouri. If you are actually
the paragon of masculine virtue that
you claim, I might reconsider.”

BERTIE AND THE BLACK ARTS

211

“A chance is all I ask,” Bertie said
dramatically. “Tell me,” he said in a
more conventional tone, “does the fam-
ily estate mount up to a tidy bit?”

“Very tidy,” his brother answered.
“Several millions at least.”

Bertie had no conception of amounts
over ten, but he knew a million to be
a hefty lot of money. He wondered
if it would be enough to pay off his
debts and set him and Ann up in a cozy
fiat?

His brother disrupted his thoughts
by rising to his feet and picking up the
parchment from the desk with a ges-
ture of disgust.

“Money is the most helpless thing
in the world,” he said scathingly. “It
is nothing in itself. Men’s cupidity
lends it value. The real and lasting
things of this world are the things that
can be locked away in the 'vaults of
the mind. I would trade all the riches
of the world for the translation of this
parchment I hold in my hand.”

Bertie looked at the parchment with
new respect.

“What is it?” he asked. “A new
system on the ponies?”

His brother sighed and placed the
parchment carefully in the drawer of
the desk. There was a despairing gleam
in his eye.

“Make yourself at home,” he said.
“I am going out. In the park the
birds are chattering and the loons are
on the lake, so I will be thinking of
ypu, Bertrand.”

A FTER his brother had left Bertie
prowled about the library, glanc-
ing vaguely at the grimly titled books
on the shelves, and musing darkly on
his own troubles.

Things did look pretty blackish, he
decided with a sigh. It was apparent
that his brother’s opinion concerning
him had not undergone any changes

for the better in the past months. And
if his brother didn’t change his mind,
Lohengrin was a long way off.

Saddened, Bertie slumped into the
chair before his brother’s desk. But
Bertie’s mind, such as it was, was in-
capable of dwelling for more than two
consecutive minutes on any problem.
Even his own feeling of frustration and
disappointment faded away, leaving
him again his vacantly cheerful self.

Whistling, he picked up the massive,
black leather bound book from his
brother’s desk. In the back of his
mind was the vague idea that since his
brother practically burned incense be-
fore these crypts of entombed learning,
it would do him no harm to dip into
their musty depths and see what was
what.

The first yellowed page of the book
bore, in archaic lettering, the ominous
inscription,

Black Arts of the
Nether Cosmos

Interested, Bertie turned another
page. There, he learned after glancing
down a few paragraphs, the proper
technique for summoning forth the de-
mons from the sixth pit of the fourth
lower world.

“Well, well,” muttered Bertie. “It’s
darned simple at that. If anybody
wanted a demon it shouldn’t be hard
to arrange things.”

Thoroughly entranced, he browsed
on, until he came to a tattered page
which was headed in solid black letters,

FORMULA FOR MYSTIC
CLARIFICATION

There he paused. As nearly as he
could figure it out one had simply to
mutter a bit of mumbo-jumbo and —
presto! everything became as clear as

212

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

crystal. He thought wistfully of the
excellent use he could have put this
device in his college days.

It was typical of Bertie that a book
of mysterious incantations, designed to
call up demons and impart superhuman
knowledge, would cause him no sur-
prise. He had a naive confidence in
the printed word; to the extent that
anything on paper was automatically
true.

As he was about to turn the page
a wonderful thought popped into his
head. It was so beautifully simple that
it took his breath away.

Q UICKLY he re-read the directions
on the Mystic Clarification page.
They weren’t difficult. In fact it only
took him a few minutes to repeat aloud
the incantation that was part of the
ritual. He waited a moment then, ex-
pecting something in the way of a blaz-
ing ball to explode in his head, but
nothing happened.

Undaunted he pulled open the
drawer of his brother’s desk and re-
moved the heavy parchment which his
brother had been vainly attempting to
translate.

After a quick glance over the sym-
bols inscribed on its ancient surface he
chuckled heartily.

“It works,” he cried gleefully.
Picking up a pencil from the desk
he scribbled down the translation on
the back of a piece of scratch paper.
This would certainly set him in solid
with his brother. It was wonderfully
simple. Why, it was just as easy as
reading something written in English.

This idea had hardly grazed his
mind, when a dampening thought oc-
curred to him. Glancing at the writing
on the parchment paper again was
enough to clinch his suspicions. The
thing was written in English. Even
Bertie possessed sufficient intelligence

to realize that it was this that made the
translation so simple.

The pencil slipped from his disap-
pointed fingers. He obviously had the
wrong parchment. A hurried search of
the desk drawer and the shelves over
the desk disclosed no other untranslat-
able parchments, so he assumed, with
one of his unusual flashes of brilliance,
that his brother must have put the doc-
ument somewhere else.

“Oh well,” he sighed, “his loss after
all.”

With a shrug he turned back to the
fascinating book. For the rest of the
afternoon he amused himself by re-
citing aloud a number of the euphonious
incantations, all of which applied to
various types of goblins, witches and
demons. He had reached voodooism
when the sport began to pall on him.
After all even the creatures of the
Nether Cosmos grow tiresome if taken
in too large doses.

With a yawn he tossed the heavy
book back to the desk and sauntered
from the library. The house was dark.
No cheery bustling from the region of
the kitchen indicated that toothsome
meals were being prepared for him, so,
with a martyred sigh, he ascended the
stairs to the guest bed room.

He wasn’t really hungry, for he had
eaten on the train, so he decided to hit
the hay and thus convince his brother
that he was really the soul of virtuous
respectability. Ordinarily the eve of
the traditional game between State and
Mosswood college would find Bertie
carousing about the bright spots of the
town, wassailing with boon and beery
companions until the wee sma’. When
his brother returned and found him
tucked peacefully away in bed and
sleeping the sleep of the innocent and
the just, perhaps it would soften his
heart a bit.

So with these cheerful speculations

BERTIE AND THE BLACK ARTS

213

buzzing about in his head Bertie turned
off the dark hallway and groped his
way into the bed room he intended to
occupy.

TK)SSIBLY it was because of this
1 preoccupation that he did not notice
the acrid odor of sulphurous smoke
which was drifting through the room.
That is, he didn’t notice it right away.

It wasn’t until he was in the middle
of the room that he paused and sniffed
the air.

“What ho! ” he said, startled. “Some-
thing burning I’ll bet.”

Bertie was generally not so swift
with his deductions. Now, possibly as
a result of his studious afternoon, he
was unusually sharp.

“Where there’s smoke there’s fire,”
he reasoned shrewdly.

He was just moving to the window
to let in a little fresh air when he no-
ticed a peculiar thing.

Circling him on all sides and sil-
houetted against the blackness of the
room were several dozen pairs of gleam-
ing white eyes.

Bertie glanced carefully about to be
sure he was not imagining things. His
scrutiny convinced him that he was not
imagining anything at all. The eyes
were there, round and white, and they
all seemed to be staring directly at him.

Now the average young man stum-
bling into a room full of staring white
eyes would probably do his thinking
with his legs and dash from the room
at top speed.

This would have been the sensible
thing to do, which is probably why
Bertie did nothing of the sort.

He peered at the circle of eyes with
interest.

As his eyes became accustomed to
the semi-darkness of the room he made
out several dark shapes perched about.
They appeared only as vague outlines

and their shadowy forms were unlike
anything Bertie had ever seen. Of
their faces he could see nothing. Only
the white staring eyes and the lumpy
black shapes were visible. There must
have been at least eight or ten of them,
perched on the furniture of the room.

“Well, well,” Bertie muttered.

He was not frightened, but he had
the strange feeling that he should have
been. The situation was rapidly devel-
oping into an impasse. After all he
couldn’t just stand there and stare at
these strange things which had chosen
his bedroom as a roosting place.

He cleared his throat, while he tried
to think of something that would more
or less break the ice.

“Well, well,” he said finally. “Warm
for May, isn’t it?”

HPHERE was a sound like the rustle
1 of dead leaves as one of the vague,
formless shapes seemed to stir slightly.
A soft, strangely toneless voice said,

“We have come to do your bidding,
Oh Master. From the haunts of the
nether cosmos we have traveled. By
the unseen powers that bind us, what is
your wish?”

Bertie listened to the sepulchral voice
with mingled emotions. He was
touched by the fact that these things —
whatever they were — seemed to be anx-
ious to help him. That, however, did
not alter the fact that there was some-
thing deuced peculiar about the whole
matter.

“Well,” he said uncertainly, “it’s nice
of you to — to stop in like this. But
just who are you, anyway?”

“I am Xanthos,” the toneless voice
replied softly.

Peering about Bertie couldn’t tell
which of the shadowy beings was speak-
ing. Not that it made a great deal of
difference.

“I’m Crimmins, Bertie Crimmins,”

214

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

Bertie said companionably, “Class of
’39. Are you boys here for the game
tomorrow?”

“We are here,” the toneless voice re-
plied, “to do your bidding.”

“Very nice of you,” Bertie said
warmly, “but I don’t need anything
just now. If I do I’ll be glad to throw
the business your way.”

There was no answer from the dark-
ness. Peering about Bertie saw that
the circle of eyes had disappeared and
that the formless dark shapes had like-
wise vanished. He also noticed that
the annoying odor of brimstone and
sulphur had faded away.

“Well, well,” he said. “Neat trick,
what?”

He stepped over and flicked on the
light switch. Everything in the room
seemed quite normal. It was unoccu-
pied and the covers of the bed were
turned down invitingly.

So Bertie undressed and went to bed.

He was just dozing off when a hazy
fragment of thought brushed his mind,
driving sleep away. Where had those
strange dark creatures come from?
Who and what were they?

These were the thoughts that buzzed
about in his head like gadflies. They
obviously weren’t college students or
star boarders. The more he toyed with
the problem the more interesting it be-
came.

He tossed from one side to the other,
tangling the covers about his neck. It
must have been fully five minutes be-
fore the light dawned on Bertie.

When it did he almost chuckled out
loud in relief.

The things — the vague black shapes
— were obviously creatures such as de-
scribed in the ancient leather bound
book he had found on his brother’s
desk. That was the first step of his
reasoning. The second was simplicity
itself. In his reading from the leather-

bound book he had apparently called
these creatures to his side. One of the
mysterious incantations must have done
the trick.

“Kind of a nasty stunt to pull on
them,” he said thoughtfully. “But,” he
decided philosophically, “it can’t be
helped now. Whatever they are — de-
mons, ghosts or ghouls — they’re here
and they’ll just have to make the best
of it.”

With a relieved sigh he snuggled
down into the covers. Now he could
sleep. With his little mystery logically
explained he could close his eyes peace-
fully. He even felt somewhat superior
about the matter. It wasn’t everyone
who could whistle up a roomful of de-
mons. No sir!

He slept like a babe.

r 'PHE next morning he awoke, cheer-
A ful and refreshed and after a brisk
shower trotted downstairs whistling en-
thusiastically.

His brother’s housekeeper met him
at the foot of the stairs.

“Morning,” Bertie said brightly.
“What’s sizzling for breakfast?”

“Breakfast was over two hours ago,”
the housekeeper answered. It was ap-
parent that this fact gave her a good
deal of satisfaction.

“Oh,” Bertie said, his spirit wilting
at the prospect of a breakfastless morn-
ing. “Well, is the big brain up yet?”

“If you are referring to your brother,
he left some time ago. I believe he in-
tended to meet the president of the
college on a very important matter.”

“Oh,” Bertie said again.

Looking at his brother’s housekeep-
er’s grim jaw he decided that the pros-
pects of wangling a spot of breakfast
from her were extremely slim.

So, he decided to take his famished
frame off to the local hotel, where he
could also arrange for tickets for the

BERTIE AND THE BLACK ARTS

215

day’s game between Mosswood and
State and phone Ann.

With a stiff bow to the housekeeper
he wrapped his injured dignity about
him like a cloak and left the house.

The hotel lobby was a swarming
mass of pennant-waving alumni and
sharp looking bookmakers who were
taking and giving bets on the game.

Bertie made for the hotel dining room
and he was halfway through a plate of
bacon and eggs when a disquieting
thought struck him.

He signaled a waiter.

“I say,” he said, “I just remembered
that I haven’t got tickets for today’s
game yet. Can’t imagine how it slipped
my mind. Will you pick me up a couple
and bring them here like a fine fellow.”

The waiter looked at him in slight
astonishment.

“You can’t be serious, sir. Surely
you must know that this game has been
sold out for weeks. Why yesterday the
scalpers were getting sixty dollars a
pair for tickets. But now there are
none available at any price.”

“Hramramm,” Bertie said thought-
fully. This was a pretty kettle of fish.
Ann had her heart set on seeing the
game. So, as a matter of fact, had
Bertie. It would be more than tragic
to miss it.

“Nothing you can do at all?” he
asked the waiter.

“Not a thing, sir.”

“Very good. Thank you.”

“Yes sir.” The waiter moved away,
leaving Bertie to his solitary gloom.

He speared a piece of bacon with
unwonted savagery.

“I wish I had a ticket,” he muttered.
“No, I wish I had two. There’s Ann
to think of. I wish I had a hundred, a
thousand of them.”

^jpHERE was a faint rustle beside
him. It was a sound like dry leaves

scraping over hard, cold earth. Bertie
hardly noticed it. He was so engrossed
in his own misery that he didn’t hear
the soft, toneless voice whisper,

“As you wish, Master!”

He went on eating, wondering what
he could possibly use as an explanation
to Ann. At last he was forced to the
realization that nothing he could tell
her would help things. She would con-
sider this just another cotton-headed
lapse on his part.

He was walking away from the table
when the waiter’s voice called after him.

“Just a moment, sir. You’re forget-
ting your package.”

Bertie turned and saw that the waiter
was lifting a small package from the
table he had just left. The package
was wrapped in brown paper and was
about eight inches square.

“Is that mine?” he asked blankly.
“It must be,” the waiter said. “I
know it wasn’t here when you arrived.
I had just cleared the table and I re-
member distinctly.”

Bertie took the package in his hand.
It wasn’t very heavy. He tried to re-
member whether or not he had had a
package with him when he entered the
hotel. The effort was a failure. He
couldn’t. It might be his at that.”
“Thanks,” he said, “silly of me to
forget it.”

He sauntered toward the lobby care-
lessly removing the outside wrappings
from the package. After all if it be-
longed to him he had a right to know
what it was, didn’t he?

As he reached the entrance of the
lobby he had finished ripping the paper
from the object. Only then did he
glance down to see what it was he had
been carrying about with him.

His knees almost failed him at the
sight.

For the package contained three neat
stacks of tickets to the game between

216

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

Mosswood and State. There must have
been at least a thousand tickets and all
of them were for locations from the
forty to the forty yard line.

He was still standing, staring dumbly
at the stacks of ducats when a heavy
set, florid faced man bumped into him.

“Watch where you’re going,” the
man growled. He started to pass on,
but then his eye dropped to the bundle
of tickets Bertie was holding in his
hands. His eyes lighted excitedly.

“Are those for today’s game?” he
demanded tensely.

“Why, yes,” Bertie said. “I guess
they are.”

“For sale?” the man snapped.

The idea hadn’t occurred to Bertie,
but now he examined it and found it an
excellent one.

“All but two,” he answered.

The florid-faced man pulled out a
well padded wallet.

“I’ll give you fifty for a pair,” he said.
“Okay?”

“That seems a fair price,” Bertie
said thoughtfully.

npHE man paid him and Bertie gave
him two tickets on the fifty yard
line.

“Tell your friends,” Bertie said geni-
ally'. “Plenty left.”

He pocketed the money with a
pleased smile and strolled on. This was
excellent. Very fine, indeed.

Before he reached the center of the
lobby he was receiving quite a bit of
attention. Men stared unbelievingly at
the thick stacks of tickets in his hands,
then edged closer to him.

In no time at all Bertie made two
more sales and now he had one hundred
and fifty dollars in his pocket.

As the word flashed about the lobby
that tickets were being sold, something
in the nature of a mild stampede re-
sulted.

“Don’t crowd, don’t crowd,” Bertie
said affably. “There’s plenty here for
everybody.”

To facilitate things he climbed onto
a table in the center of the lobby. There
he was able to pass out the tickets to
the crowd below him with little diffi-
culty. From their extended hands he
plucked the green bills and the feeling
of happiness within him grew deeper
with each additional purchase.

“Thank you, thank you,” he said.
“It’s really dirt cheap, you know. It’s
practically a steal. Thank you , and you
too. Who else? There you are. Fifty
dollars to see Mosswood beat State is
practically a robbery.”

Bertie became aware of a sharp fea-
tured, nattily dressed chap standing
directly in front of the table, glancing
up at him with unwinking gray eyes.

“Yes sir,” he said genially, “how
many?”

“I got tickets,” the sharp featured
little man answered, “I just heard you
say Mosswood’s goin’ to beat State.
Would you care to back that up With a
little cash?”

“My dear fellow,” Bertie said in a
kind voice, “do you actually mean to
tell me that you have money to throw
away? State does not have a chance,
that’s all there is to it. Save your let-
tuce, my good chap. Invest it in an-
nuities or life insurance, but don’t bet
on State.”

The nattily dressed fellow pulled a
roll of bills from his pocket.

“I’m not worrying. If you’re on
Mosswood, put up or shut up.”

Bertie’s pride was touched to the
quick.

“Sir,” he said, “name the amount and
make it light on yourself.”

It took only a few moments to ar-
range the bet. The money was held by
the hotel desk clerk. Bertie bet every
cent he had made on the tickets and

BERTIE AND THE BLACK ARTS

217

felt stoutly virtuous about it. After all,
it wasn’t really gambling. It was just
a quick pleasant manner of doubling
his stakes.

/ "PHE bet made, the sharp featured
1 little gambler smirked unpleasantly
at him and swaggered away.

“Who is he?” Bertie asked the clerk

“Him? Oh he’s one of the bookmak-
ers who comes down to this game every
year. They call him Sure Thing Lind-
say.”

“Hmmmm,” Bertie said.

“That’s because he never bets on
anything but a sure thing.”

“Hmmmm,” Bertie said again. “Sure
Thing Lindsay, eh?”

It was while he was musing upon the
unpleasant things that Mr. Lindsay’s
nickname suggested that he felt a firm
tap on his shoulder.

Turning, he was confronted by two
solidly built gentlemen, dressed in gray
overcoats and gray fedoras and wearing
large black shoes.

“You the guy who’s scalping the
tickets?” one of them asked.

Bertie’s spirits rose. Here was fresh
fish.

“I’m the one, boys,” he said cheer-
fully. “Better get ’em now before the
price goes up. How many?”

“Probably one to ten,” one of the
gray overcoated men said grimly. He
pulled a badge from his pocket and
shoved it under Bertie’s nose. “We’ve
been warning you scalpers all week and
now I think we’re goin’ to make an
example out of you. We didn’t think
we’d find any of you dumb enough to
scalp tickets right in the lobby of the
leading hotel.”

“Now just a minute, gentlemen,”
Bertie said feebly. “This is all some
terrible mistake.”

“You said it. And you’re the one
that made it. Come on.”

Bertie heard a metallic click and felt
cold steel on his wrists. Handcuffed,
and with a burly plainclothes man on
either side of him, he was led across
the lobby, protesting weakly and vain-

iy-

Things looked very black. Gloomy
thoughts bobbed through his head.
What kind of a country was this turn-
ing into, anyway? A man tried to pick
up an honest penny and he found him-
self bundled off to the bastille for pos-
sessing a little initiative.

He would certainly miss the game
now. And so would Ann. Worse, he
couldn’t get in touch with her and tell
her he was in jail. That definitely
would not be wise.

It was a terrible mess. He didn’t see
how things could possibly be worse.

In this dark mood he was hustled
across the lobby to the revolving doors
that led to the street. There, to his in-
tense humiliation, he was forced to
stand like a culprit in the dock, while a
steady flow of morbidly curious people
surged past him.

Feeling as hounded and persecuted
as Jean Valjean in Les Miserables, he
nevertheless affected a blandly non-
chalant pose. He even hummed a pop-
ular ditty and kept time with his feet.
He’d show ’em. Let them try and break
his spirit. So absorbed was he in this
role that he didn’t notice the last two
people to enter the revolving door.

He had no idea that disaster was
practically nipping at his heels until a
smooth, icily cold voice inquired,

“Is this your rehabilitated self?”

T)ERTIE jerked himself around, the
breath left his lungs in a gust as he
recognized the cold, stern features of
his brother.

With his brother was a short, thin,
scholarly looking gentleman whom Ber-
tie also recognized. This was Profes-

218

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

sor Overton, president of Mosswood
college.

He was peering near-sightedly at
Bertie through his horn-rimmed spec-
tacles.

“I say, Professor,” he said to Bertie’s
brother, “this chap with the handcuffs
on reminds me of your brother.”

“He is my brother,” Bertie’s brother
said bitterly. “What’s the charge, of-
ficer?” he asked, turning to one of the
plain-clothes men.

“Scalping football tickets, peddling
without a license, disturbing the peace
and probably grand larceny.”

“Grand larceny!” Bertie gasped in
outraged indignation. “I haven’t stolen
anything.”

“Where ’d you get them tickets?”

“I found them,” Bertie said stoutly.
Bertie’s brother shook his head grimly.

“This,” he said, “is only a concrete
example of what I told you yesterday.
You are still mentally and physically
incompetent. Anything which I can do
to prevent your marrying some unsus-
pecting girl I most certainly will do.
You have disgraced me completely,
Bertrand. Continue with your duty,
officers.”

Bertie was shoved through the re-
volving door, his protests and promises
flowing back over his shoulder. Out-
side, one more calamitous experience
was awaiting him.

Alighting from a cab at the entrance
of the hotel was a slim, lovely blonde
girl. As she turned to enter the hotel,
Bertie staggered through the revolving
door, his handcuffed hands extended
before him to keep his balance.

The lovely blonde girl paused for an
instant, then with a sob she turned and
stepped back into the cab.

Only then did Bertie recognize her.

“Ann!” he cried frantically. “Ann!
Things aren’t as bad as they look. This
is all a joke. I lost a bet. Ann! Come

back.”

But his words were practically
smothered in the roar of the cab as it
shot away from the curb and into the
traffic.

Bertie was left quite alone. Not
quite, because the two gray-overcoated
officers were still with him. But in
spirit he was bleakly and desolately
alone.

“Madame Guillotine,” he said black-
ly, “I embrace you.”

“He’s nuts,” one copper said.

The other nodded.

'T'HE American jailing system, in
Bertie’s opinion, had not been no-
ticeably improved since last he had fa-
vored the institution with his presence.

The cell was small, the doors and
windows barred. This last was the
worst feature. It gave everything such
a definite look.

He had been pacing the floor for five
hours and now he gave up and slumped
down on the cell’s narrow cot. With
a touch of Yogi fatalism he had stopped
worrying about Ann and his brother.
For all practical purposes they were
out of his life forever from henceforth
onward. In later years when time had
mellowed them, they might begin
speaking to him again, but as for the
present, he was a dead duck.

It was late afternoon, he decided by
glancing up at the window. The Hom-
eric struggle between Mosswood and
State was probably in its final period
by now. Soon it would be history.

He began pacing again. Of course
losing the esteem and affection of his
girl and his brother was a disastrous
blow, but missing the annual game with
State was no light matter in itself.

The fact that almost a thousand dol-
lars of his money was on Mosswood
only increased his feeling of frustra-
tion.

BERTIE AND THE BLACK ARTS

219

Overcome by anxiety he grabbed the
bars and jerked at them foolishly.

“I want to get out of here,” he
shouted. “Let me out, do you hear?”
There was a rustle behind him.

“I hear you, Masterl” a soft, tone-
less voice whispered.

“What's that?” Bertie said, startled.
He peered through the bars into the
empty corridor. “Who said that?”

“I, Xanthos, have heard you and am
here to do your bidding, Master.”

This time Bertie turned around and
saw a vague crouching shape in one
dark comer of the cell. At the same
time he remembered his experience
with the demons the night before. An-
other thing dawned on him. He sud-
denly realized from where the football
tickets had come. Xanthos, or one of
his ghoul apprentices, had obviously
been responsible for that. He was sur-
prised that he hadn’t thought of this
before.

“Well, Xanthos,” he said sternly. “It
seems that everything you do gets me
into trouble. I can’t say as I like it
either.”

“I am sorry,” the cold lifeless voice
said, “but I cannot help that. I must
obey your commands.”

“Supposing I give you a command
right now,” Bertie asked cautiously.
“What then?”

“I would obey.”

“Supposing I would tell you to get
me out of this blasted jail?”

“It would be accomplished.”

“Then,” Bertie said contentedly,
“your days of unemployment are over.
Get to work.”

“As you wish, Master.”

'T'HE dark shape in the corner flitted
out of the range of his vision and
the next instant he felt a pair of sharp
claws resting on his shoulder.

“Do not be alarmed,” Xanthos’ voice

was almost in his ear. “I am on your
shoulder. We will leave together.”

Bertie started to turn his head but
Xanthos’ voice, suddenly as chilling as
ice, stopped him.

“Do not look as you value your san-
ity!”

“Why?” Bertie asked stubbornly.

“Do not look,” Xanthos repeated.
“You would not — like what you would
see. I am not — pleasing to the eye.”

“Sorry, old chap,” Bertie said,
touched. “I know just how you feel.
I was self-conscious when I had pim-
ples on my face. All in the mind,
though, all in the mind. Just forget
about how you look and people won’t
notice you.”

“Let us leave,” Xanthos said.

“Sure thing,” Bertie said eagerly.
“Just how do we go about it? Ride
away on a broom?”

“Certainly not,” Xanthos answered.
“My method is less involved.”

Bertie heard a sharp metallic click,
then the barred door of the cell swung
open.

“Well, well,” he exclaimed delight-
edly. “That is simple.”

He stepped jauntily from the cell.
With the confidence that Xanthos could
handle any situation that might arise,
he strode cheerfully down the corridor.
The heavy steel door that separated the
cell block from the jailer’s office looked
impregnable. But before he reached
it, it swung ponderously open.

The warden was dozing comfortably
before a pot-bellied stove when he
heard the hinges of the massive door
creak warningly. He opened his eyes
and struggled to his feet just as Bertie
sauntered nonchalantly into his office.

His hand speared for the gun at his
hip.

Bertie felt an uncomfortable sensa-
tion at the pit of his stomach.

“Now don’t do anything rash,” he

220

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

said nervously.

His admonition was unnecessary.
For the warden’s bulging, incredulous
gaze was riveted in horror at a point
about five inches above Bertie’s left
shoulder.

His lips twisted and the gun slid from
his limp fingers. Then with a soft moan
he pitched, forward to the floor.

“That is fortunate,” Xanthos said
drily. “When he comes to he will think
this was just a nightmare. Had he re-
mained conscious any longer he would
spend the rest of his life in a strait
jacket.”

“You can’t be that bad,” Bertie
scoffed. “You’ve got a touch of an in-
feriority complex, that’s all. You
ought to read Dale Carnegie. He’d
straighten you out.”

“Nevertheless,” Xanthos said, “I
shall make myself invisible for the rest
of our trip. You may look now with
safety.”

Bertie turned his head and saw noth-
ing. But he could still feel the grip of
the claws on his shoulder.

“What is your wish now?” Xanthos
inquired.

“I’ll let you know when we get to the
game,” Bertie said, glancing through
the window at the setting sun. “That
is if we get there on time.”

'IX/'HEN they arrived at the jam-
packed stadium the minutes of
the fourth quarter were ticking away
and Mosswood College was trailing by
six points.

Bertie squirmed his way through the
crowd to the middle of the field. One
anguished glance told him that State
was threatening to score again.

They had the ball on the Moss-
wood’s thirty yard line. And on their
first play from scrimmage a fleet-footed
State back broke loose and streaked for
the Mosswood goal.

“Xanthos!” Bertie cried. “Do some-
thingl”

“This seems beyond my ken,” Xan-
thos answered. There was a bewildered
note in the demon’s voice. “Everything
is so confused and upset. What is it
you want me to do?”

“Stop that man!” Bertie shrieked.
“That man that the others are chas-
ing. “Don’t let him get away.”

“As you wish,” Xanthos muttered.

Bertie felt the claws on his shoulders
tighten. But his eyes were riveted on
the sprinting State back. He was rac-
ing down the field, yards ahead of the
nearest Mosswood player. . . . Past
the fifteen ... the ten ... the five

“Xanthos 1” Bertie screamed.
“You’re a washout. You’re fired.
You—”

The words froze on his lips. For an
incredible, unimaginable thing had hap-
pened on the field. Along the end of
the gridiron, just before the goal line,
a huge yawning pit had miraculously
opened.

From this black pit flames shot forth,
forking their way through the belching
waves of sulphur laden smoke which
poured out with them.

The touchdown-bound State back
wheeled from this trench of hideous fire
and brimstone and, with a wild bellow
of fright, raced in the opposite direc-
tion.

A solid roar of incredulous sound
burst from the throats of the spectators.
On the field the two teams milled about
in hopeless confusion and bewilder-
ment. All, that is, except the State
back who was still legging it in the
opposite direction, the ball held tightly
under one arm.

In the wild, screaming crowd there
was only one person who had any idea
of what had happened. And that was
Bertie Crimmins. He knew that Xan-
thos had been the agency behind this

BERTIE AND THE BLACK ARTS

221

miraculous demonstration. The knowl-
edge brought him a warm glow of con-
tentment. How could he lose with such
forces backing him?

Listening to the excited comments
about him he realized that no one had
an accurate idea of what had happened.
There was a different and conflicting
story on every pair of lips.

Then a new roar broke from the
crowd.

The frantically fleeing State back
was racing for the Mosswood College
goal linel Those of his teammates who
had recovered their senses started after
him, shouting desperately.

But the roar of the crowd drowned
out their voices and amid a deafening
volume of noise the State back galloped
over the wrong goal line giving Moss-
wood six points and tying up the game.

TJERTIE relaxed, sighing happily.

The game was tied up now and
with a bit of assistance from Xanthos
it would soon be in the bag. At least
from the wreckage of his life he could
salvage his bets and start anew.

“Well done, Xanthos,” he said com-
placently. “Now just arrange things
for a Mosswood touchdown and every-
thing will be jake.”

There was no answer.

“Xanthos!” he said sharply. “Do
you hear me?”

Silence.

A bead of perspiration stood out on
Bertie’s forehead. There was a cold
empty’ feeling in the pit of his stomach.

“Xanthos 1” he said pleadingly.
“Don’t get in a sulk now. I really
need you.”

There was no answer. And when the
game ended a few moments later, a tie
twelve to twelve, there was still no evi-
dence of Xanthos.

Bertie’s head sagged forward against
his chest. The crowd surged past his

lonely figure but he hardly noticed.
Time passed. It was almost dark be-
fore Bertie stood up and left the sta-
dium.

He realized with bitter clarity that
his thoughtless dismissal of Xanthos
had been final and definite. He had
fired Xanthos. And Xanthos evidently
meant to stay fired.

There was only one bright spot in
the otherwise gray scheme of things.
He hadn’t lost all of his money. In
the case of a tie all bets were off, but
this was somehow negative compensa-
tion in the face of all he had lost.

He hailed a cab dispiritedly and gave
his brother’s address. With a moody
sigh he decided to leave town and lose
himself to society. Years later he might
emerge from the Australian bush, calm
and kindly, forgetting the slings and
arrows that had driven him there. Now
they pressed on his soul like a drab
pall. Life was very sad.

TN this same cheerless state of mind
he entered his brother’s home. The
light was on in the library and he could
hear the low murmur of voices from the
room. His hopes of slipping by un-
noticed were blasted sky high as his
brother suddenly appeared in the door-
way, his face flaming with excitement.

“Bertie!” he shouted in a most un-
scholarly voice. “Come in here.”

With a fatalistic sigh Bertie entered
the library. What devil’s brew was be-
ing hatched for him now he had no
idea. Nor did he care. Nothing could
ever bother him again.

Professor Overton, president of
Mosswood, was standing beside his
brother’s desk.

“It is absolutely incredible,” Bertie
heard him murmur.

“What is, sir?” Bertie asked blankly.

“Bertie,” his brother said implor-
ingly, “for once in your life think care-

222

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

fully. Did you write this?”

He thrust an envelope before Bertie,
on which was scrawled — in Bertie’s
handwriting — the words he had copied
from the parchment.

“Why, I guess I did,” Bertie said.

“You guess?” his brother shouted.
“Don’t you know?”

“Why yes,” Bertie said, a little
startled by his brother’s vehemence, “I
did write it. I copied it from the parch-
ment that I found in the drawer of your
desk.”

“This parchment?” his brother
asked, extending the ancient papyrus
toward him.

Bertie looked at it closely. Yes, it
was the same one. Same paper, same
ink — No ! It wasn’t written in English
as the other had been. It couldn’t be
the same paper. The heiroglyphic
scrawls on this parchment looked like
the tracks of an inebriated chicken.

“Bertie,” his brother said weakly,
“This writing on the back of the enve-
lope which you claim to have written is
a perfect translation of this parchment
document which the entire university
has been working on for two years..
How did you do it?”

Bertie blinked as his brother’s words
seeped into his brain. It didn’t really
make sense even then. As far as he
could gather he was being accused of
having done something rather clever.
This was so surprising that it rendered
him speechless.

He was sure he hadn’t translated the
abstruse and unintelligible document.
The parchment from which he had
copied had been as easy to read as
English. He was opening his mouth
to deny any connection with the trans-
lation when a staggering thought struck
him.

Maybe he had actually translated it.
At the time he had been under the in-
fluence of the Mystic Clarification for-

mula and maybe the hieroglyphic sym-
bols had only seemed to be English.
That, undoubtedly, was it!

JLJE PAUSED and lighted a cigarette
nonchalantly.

“How did I do it?” he repeated his
brother’s question casually. “Well I
hardly see how I can explain it to you.
The principle involved is rather intri-
cate. Tell me: Have you ever heard
of the reverse double wing system?”
His brother and Professor Overton
shook their heads humbly.

Bertie smiled patronizingly.

“You see?” he said. “We just don’t
have any common basis for discussion.”
“Bertie,” his brother said in a
strangled voice, “when did you take up
the study of philology?”

“Always liked the stuff,” Bertie said
genially. “Sort of a hobby. Fine way
to spend winter evenings.”

The front door bell rang then, sav-
ing Bertie from more embarrassing and
penetrating questions.

A second later and Ann walked into
the room, looking more blonde and
more lovely than he had ever seen her.
She stopped abruptly when she saw
him.

“I didn’t come to see you,” she said
stiffly. “I only came to leave a message
for you that I was leaving.”

“Can’t all this wait a moment,” Pro-
fessor Overton broke in testily. “Young
man,” he said to Bertie, “I would be
honored if you would consider joining
the faculty staff of Mosswood College.
Men of your erudition and intelligence
are all too few in this troubled world.
Mosswood needs you.”

Bertie’s brother laid a hand on his
shoulder.

“I’ve wronged you, Bertie. I can
see that now. It makes me feel
ashamed of myself. You can expect
my blessing on anything you intend

BERTIE AND THE BLACK ARTS

223

doing. Particularly if you are figuring
on setting up a partnership.”

Bertie turned toward Ann, and in
three seconds flat she was in his arms.

“Darling,” she murmured against his
coat, “I don’t understand any of it, but
you seem like a new person. I’m sure
that there is a perfectly reasonable ex-
planation for your having been arrested
and everything.”

“There certainly is,” Bertie said hap-
pily. “Fact is, they caught me with the
goods. No! I mean it was all a case
of mistaken identity.”

He put his arms about the girl of his
dreams and sighed happily. One min-
ute he had been hopelessly crushed and
the next thing he’d been transported to
the clouds.

He was conscious that his brother
was beaming fondly upon him and that
THE

even Professor Overton was bestowing
admiring glances in his direction.
Everything was excellent. Except —
“By the way,” he said casually,
“there’s a leather bound book on your
desk that kind of interested me. All
about — demons and such. Anything
to that stuff, you suppose?”

His brother laughed heartily.'

“I know the book,” he said. “It
would take someone with the mind of a
child to believe in the existence of such
creatures. Demons. The very idea is
ridiculous.”

“So it is,” Bertie said. “So it is.”
He laughed at the absurdity of it all
and then he kissed Ann very soundly.
Later, however, he couldn’t get the
idea out of his head that as he was kiss-
ing her a toneless voice whispered,
“Very excellent effort, Master.”
END

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STORIES

ON SALE AT NEWSSTANDS EVERYWHERE FEBRUARY 10th!

The LEGEHD of III II I! Ii 8HRYI1E

By JOHN YORK CABOT

These songs were real ly ghost-written — and
Mark Shayne sold them as his own creation .

T O those who know anything
about that stretch of Mid-Man-
hattan called Tin Pan Alley, and
even to those who dance, sing, and
listen to the tunes that pour forth
weekly from that madhouse of Ameri-
can melody — the name and legend of
Mark Shayne must certainly be fa-
miliar.

Shayne, composer of Baby, Why Do
I Care ? , Heartbreak Melody, Just Ask
Your Heart About Me, and countless
other hit songs far too numerous to
mention, was as much a part of musical
America as Cole Porter, Irving Berlin,
Jerome Kern, or George Gershwin.

He was, in fact, looked upon along
the Great White Way as not only a
top-notch tunesmith, but a sensationally
stellar success story. Broadway wise
men could recount to you, even to the
date and year, the thrilling episode in
the first rung of the ladder in Shayne’s
career — the “break” that took him from
the ranks of obscure publicity men and
started him toward the proverbial Fame
and Fortune he was later to attain as a
Great Composer.

The “break” occurred a little over
ten years ago, just about the time that
the depression had settled over the na-
tion to stay a little while. The financial
gloom that had blanketed the United
States was felt everywhere, and— as
Variety can tell you — nowhere more
than on Broadway.

Only the most venturesome produc-

ers were risking their bank rolls in the
theater, and the majority of those who
did wound up inevitably in the poor
house. The darkened theatrical palaces
along the Main Stem were like mauso-
leums in a cemetery, and the lightless
signs outside them were as markers to
grave plots.

Actors, agents, singers, dancers were
starving to death with what became
monotonous regularity. Theatrical pro-
ductions, as rare as flowers that bloom
in the fall, became coveted plums over
which thrushes and thespians alike
were only too eager to knife one
another.

In Mark Shayne’s racket — publicity
— conditions were no better. And if
it hadn’t been for Shayne’s very early
training in the art of cutting a friend’s
throat, he might never have landed the
job to publicize the small musical
comedy, Yipeee!, which opened rehears-
als bravely in the face of conditions.

The cast for Yipeee !, even to the
chorines, were all working on a when-
and-if basis. In theatrical parlance,
when-and-if meant that they would get
paid for their efforts only when, and
if, the show made money. This was,
of course, in blatant disregard of the
wishes of Equity — that worthy organ-
ization designed to protect the rights
of show people. But with times as
they were, Equity occasionally closed
its eyes in such matters and breathed
a prayer for the good luck of its

226

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

children.

Needless to say, the publicity serv-
ices of Mark Shayne were secured on
such a when-and-if agreement. This
was all right with Shayne, however, for
he was working while the rest of his
colleagues were subsisting on canned
dog food.

Van Evans Garth was the Producer
of Yipeee! Undoubtedly you’ve read
of Garth in the history of the theater.
Called the Grand Old Man of the
stage, he had been at the peak of his
career in the middle Twenties. And
during the year in which Yipeee l was
staged, the Grand Old Man was def-
initely riding a sled to oblivion. You’ll
recall that he died three years after
Yipeee!

Unfortunately, Van Evans Garth
was thinking in terms of the gay
Twenties when he produced Yipeee!
The musical comedy was as dated as
your morning coffee. The costumes
were behind times, the story had been
told too often to seem fresh, the songs
and lyrics were equally, or perhaps
especially, lousy.

The cast was faintly aware of all
this as rehearsal weeks droned on. But
their loyalty to the Grand Old Man,
and the fact that they had nothing else,
kept them plugging along. Even Mark
Shayne stuck by the show, although he
had never won prizes in school for
loyalty.

But while Shayne stuck by, Shayne
looked around and privately arranged
to sue the Grand Old Man for back
salary just in case. There is no doubt
that Shayne would eventually have
sued, except for what occurred four
days before Yipeee! was to open.

TT was after a dismally frantic re-
hearsal that Shayne buttonholed the
Grand Old Man. They were alone in
the theater when Shayne spoke his

mind.

“Listen, Van,” Shayne said sharply
to the tired old man, “this thing stinks.
No matter what you do to it, or try
to do with it, it smells up the stem.
You’ll close in a night.”

Van Evans Garth winced at the
brutality of the criticism. He shook
his white head wearily from side to
side.

“Don’t say that, my boy. There are
still three rehearsals. Other shows I
have produced have seemed as tedious
before the opening. It is just your
nerves.”

Shayne’s sharp features twisted nast-
ily.

“Nerves, hell,” he spat. “It stinks
no matter how you look at it.”

“You are to publicize it, not criticize
it,” the old man reminded him wearily.

“What stinks more than anything
else,” Shayne went on, ignoring him,
“is the music — plus the lyrics. And
that’s what I’m talking to you about.
You’re gonna throw out the music and
the lyrics ! ”

“What?” the old man looked at
Shayne as though he had lost his mind.
“Three nights before the show opens
you want me to throw out the lyrics?”

“And the music,” Shayne reminded
him. “You are going to use my music
and my lyrics.”

The Grand Old Man shook his head
sadly.

“You are delirious, my boy. You
are not a musician, and you know noth-
ing of lyric writing. You have not
been eating enough. You are delirious.
Here,” he fished into a worn wallet in
which there reposed two five-dollar
bills, “I have but ten dollars. Take
five of it, my boy. Get a good meal
today and tomorrow. Opening night
I will have something for all of you.”

Shayne took the bill.

“Thanks,” he said. “But you are

THE LEGEND OF MARK SHAYNE

227

going to use my songs and my lyrics
in this show— no matter what it does
to the last three rehearsals. And if
you don’t,” he paused significantly, “I
think I can give the newspapers some-
thing in the way of a story about an ex
Big Time Producer who has a wife in
the nut house.”

The color drained from Van Evans
Garth’s face. He stared in wordless
horror at his publicity man. His hands
began to tremble visibly. The muscles
in his mouth twitched.

Shayne brought forth a portfolio.

“I have the new music and lyrics
here,” he said. “Suppose you start
going over them now?”

The Grand Old Man’s hands were
still shaking badly as he reached for
the portfolio. . . .

npHUS, the Broadway wise men will
tell you, Mark Shayne got his first
“break.” But of course there are cer-
tain elements, such as the threatened
shame the publicity man held over Van
Evans Garth’s head, that never came
to light. The Broadway wise men
knew nothing of this, and their Shayne
Legend recounts only that the brilliant
young composer, seeing the weakness
of the music and lyrics in Ytpeee!, per-
suaded the Grand Old Man to -substi-
tute the Shayne epics at the last minute.
And the sages of the Main Stem are also
sadly lacking in another bit of informa-
tion concerning this first episode in the
Shayne Legend. They didn’t know —
as the Grand Old Man had known —
that Mark Shayne was definitely not
a musician, and that he knew nothing
of lyric writing.

They do not know that on the same
night Shayne “persuaded” Van Evans
Garth to use new music and lyrics in
Ytpeee l, he made a later visit to another
white haired old man. This second old
man was an Austrian professor of

music, starving in a New York tene-
ment flat. His name was Johann
Gelder, and he was pathetically, breath-
lessly, on edge when Mark Shayne
burst into his dirty little room. . . .

J OHANN GELDER had been work-
ing on some musical arrangements
when Shayne’s knock sounded on the
door. Heart hammering in excitement,
the old man rose and crossed the room.
Shayne was standing there grinning
when he opened up.

“You have seen him?” Johann Gelder
asked excitedly.

Shayne entered, threw his hat on
the clean, ragged, little bed, and
nodded.

“Yeah,” I talked to him. “I con-
vinced him that he ought to use the new
tunes and lyrics. They’ll be in the
show when it opens.”

There were stars in Johann Gelder’s
eyes. There was overwhelming grati-
tude in his heart. This was his chance
-—at long last!

“But there’s one condition, of
course,” Mark Shayne declared. “Since
no one in this country knows anything
about you, and especially since your
name means nothing on Broadway,
those tunes and lyrics will have to be
presented under my name.”

Johann Gelder looked at Mark
Shayne uncomprehendingly.

“But why am I not to be given credit
for my songs, my lyrics?”

Shayne gave the older man a look of
intense exasperation.

“It’s like I told you,” he blazed.
“Names mean a lot. Yours is unknown.
To put the first few tunes of yours
over, it’ll be smarter to use a name
that’s known a little around the Main
Stem— my name!”

Johann Gelder shook his head sadly.
“But it is so strange.”

Shayne turned toward the door.

228

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

“All right. I’ll tell Van Evans Garth
that you don’t want the tunes in his
show.”

“No! No!” Johann Gelder cried.
“I do not mean that, Mr. Shayne. Do
as you see best, of course!”

Shayne turned back, grinning.

“Now you’re using your head,” he
said. “There’s a little agreement here
I had drawn up, just a gentleman’s con-
tract, really. I’ll want you to sign it.
It’ll be sort of a partnership affair.
You’ll write the tunes, I’ll handle them
for you.”

Johann Gelder nodded docilely, as
he was to nod in much the same man-
ner during the decade that followed.

T>ACK numbers of Variety will tell
you that the musical comedy,
Yipeee! didn’t fold after its first night
opening. Actually, it lasted five per-
formances. The cast and Van Evans
Garth were left penniless for their
efforts after expenses had been met.
But four of the songs from the show
were picked up by bright-eyed music
publishers and contracted for with their
“composer” Mark Shayne.

Of these tunes, all made money, and
two fell into the category of “smash
hits.” Mark Shayne’s name as a com-
poser was born over night. And Johann
Gelder was especially pleased with the
hundred-dollar check Shayne bestowed
on him. It kept the old Austrian com-
poser for six weeks, during which time
he turned out another song.

Shayne moved from his cheap lodg-
ing house into a terraced apartment on
Park Avenue. Those were the days
when terraced apartments were being
given away with newspaper subscrip-
tions, of course. But even at that,
Shayne wasn’t living beyond himself.
After all, the songs were bringing in
close to a thousand dollars a month.

For the remainder of the year, Mark

Shayne contented himself with two
more hit songs. One of them, Baby,
Why Do */ Care?, is still sung today.
You began to see Shayne’s name in all
the Broadway columns, and his home
town, a tiny hamlet in Iowa, proudly
advertised on a billboard beside the
state highway that ran through the
village that it was the birthplace of the
celebrated Mark Shayne.

In January, Mark Shayne took
Johann Gelder out of his dingy tene-
ment house and placed him in a tiny
country cottage. The old man was
pleased to the point of tears of grati-
tude. He had fresh air, and rolling
hills, four rooms, and a piano. It cost
Shayne fifty dollars a month — seventy-
five for food and incidentals. But after
all, he was wise enough to know the
value of keeping his investment out of
sight and healthy.

Two years passed, bringing with
them three more hit songs from Shayne.
He had turned down three Hollywood
offers to do the scores for musical
comedy films. It was at the end of
the third year that Van Evans Garth
died. The record on- the coroner’s
ledger stated that the Grand Old Man
had passed away from malnutrition.
Mark Shayne was one of his pall-
bearers.

And the stone heart of Broadway
was touched to see the young composer
choking back his tears as he assisted
the man who gave him his first break
to his final resting place. The Shayne
Legend has it that the successful young
composer’s greatest grief was that he
had known nothing of Garth’s plight,
and could easily have saved him if it
hadn’t been for the Grand Old Man’s
fierce pride.

Another piece of the Shayne Legend
recounts how, just before Garth’s
casket was closed, Mark Shayne quietly
placed a gold-mounted five-dollar bill

THE LEGEND OF MARK SHAYNE

229

in the old producer’s clasped hands —
symbolizing the aid which the Grand
Old Man once extended to Mark
Shayne. It was all very touching, and
was the subject of conversation for
weeks along the Main Stem.

But the tide moved on, and Van
Evans Garth soon became forgotten,
while Mark Shayne went on to greater
and greater successes. His musical
comedy, This 'Is the Life, became the
most talked of show since the turn of
the New Deal.

TOHANN GELDER, happy with his
J fresh air and rolling hills and hun-
dred dollars every month — Shayne had
upped the ante twenty-five dollars after
the musical comedy hit — continued to
turn out some of the catchiest songs
of the nation.

People mentioned Mark Shayne in
the same breath with Victor Herbert
and Johann Strauss. And the young
composer modestly admitted to being
one of the greatest musical figures of
the century. In 1937, Mark Shayne
paid income tax on five-hundred-thou-
sand dollars. And in the following
year that figure was doubled.

Then, for the first six months of the
next year, Johann Gelder didn’t write
a single piece of music. Shayne, who
had contracts calling for three songs a
year, was positively furious with the
old man. He made a special trip to
see him. . . .

Johann Gelder had aged consider-
ably and showed it. Even the fresh
air and sunshine hadn’t been able to
stay the ravages of what ailed him. His
wrinkled features were torn with
anxiety, grief, and torment as he faced
Mark Shayne.

“It is not that I do not try, Mr.
Shayne,” the old man said pleadingly.
“It is not that I am ungrateful for all
you have done for me. But music I

no longer feel. Gay tunes no longer
come from my heart. My people, in
Austria, surely you read of the misery
that has engulfed them!”

Shayne’s sharp features were wrath-
ful.

“To hell with that noise!” he
snapped. “We have a contract that
your damned slop sentiment can’t
break. How’d you like to go back to
the gutters where I found you, eh?”

Johann Gelder sat down beside his
beloved piano, head in hands.

“I cannot,” he sobbed. “I cannot.”

Ice was beginning to form in Mark
Shayne’s veins. He felt a terror which
he was wise enough not to reveal before
the old man. Changing his attitude
a little, he put his hand on Gelder’s
shoulder.

“Turn out a tune around that, then,”
he said desperately. “Put all you feel
into music.”

Johann Gelder looked up slowly. Be-
hind the pain in his old eyes there was
a glowing fire.

“You are right,” he said softly. “I
know you are right. I shall try ! ”

Mark Shayne drove back to New
York two days later with another song,
and grave misgivings. He went imme-
diately to the office of his publishers.

“Look,” Mark Shayne told John
Colder, head of the publishing organ-
ization, “it’s like this, John.”

And then Shayne went on to say,
with much dramatization, almost ex-
actly what Johann Gelder had said.

“There’s no more real happiness in
the world today, John,” Shayne said,
while the sweat rolled down the neck-
band of his twenty-five dollar shirt.
“There’s no real laughter. People are
being killed, oppressed. Nations are
being overrun. I can’t find it in me
to write the light, happy stuff anymore,
John.”

It may be said much to John Colder’s

230

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

favor, that the round little music pub-
lisher had no particular liking for Mark
Shayne. Now he eyed him rather
coldly.

“But you’ve got a contract, Mark,”
he reminded him. “We have money,
plenty of it, tied up in the advance
plugging of your next tune. We have
to have it. No matter how you feel.”

“Have your boy play this,” Mark
Shayne said, extending the music manu-
script and holding his breath. “It was
all I could find to write.”

An employee played the song, and
Colder listened. He asked that it be
played again. He looked over the
lyrics, then he looked up at Mark
Shayne dubiously.

“You’ve never written a tune like
this before,” he said.

Mark Shayne felt cold all over.

“You mean it’s not — ” he began.

“I mean it’s magnificent,” Colder
said quietly.

TT was magnificent. It was a sensa-
tion. Undoubtedly you heard it.
It was called. Now They Are Left Be-
hind. It was Johann Gelder’s peak,
his masterpiece.

It was Johann Gelder’s last song. He
died, from grief and old age, two weeks
after its publication. And Mark
Shayne, riding on the crest of the
masterpiece he hadn’t composed, came
close to going insane.

Shayne had made millions from
Gelder’s songs, but he had thrown most
of it around like rice. Even Now They
Are Left Behind, although it was mint-
ing money, wouldn’t take care of
Shayne’s style of living for long. There
had to be more tunes, other songs. And
where was he going to get them?

Johann Gelder had taken Mark
Shayne’s talent with him to the grave.

He had money, fame, he could hire
another ghost writer perhaps. Shayne

thought desperately about this angle.
There should surely be another starv-
ing composer around New York who
would be only too glad to ghost songs
for Shayne. But he knew of none.
And the successful composers, natu-
rally, couldn’t be touched. Shayne
couldn’t even risk hiring a starving
composer, for if that ghost’s songs were
bad — and Shayne had little ability to
tell a good song from a poor one — it
meant a staggering loss in prestige.

Shayne began to drink more heavily
than before. Perhaps he drank in an
effort to find a way out of his dilemma.
Or perhaps he drank to shut out the
songs of Johann Gelder which came
to him wherever he went.

He tried to compose himself. He
had learned to play the piano during
his decade of fame. But his efforts
were miserably futile. And another
four-month period was running out. A
four-month period which would mean
another song.

John Colder gave him two additional
months to get a song to him. Two
months beyond contract stipulations.
And then he was forced to break the
contract. The word was around the
Main Stem that Shayne was slipping,
drinking himself into oblivion.

And then there was the night that
Shayne got roaringly drunk in a small
dive in Greenwich Village. Somehow
he ended up in a tiny, unknown cafe.
There was a woman there. Not the
type of blonde beauty that Shayne was
used to having around him. This
woman was old, thin, gray, and hag-
gard. Shayne found himself buying
her drinks and babbling drunkenly
about his troubles. Shayne, of course,
was hardly conscious that he was re-
vealing as much as he was until the
old crone’s voice came reedily to him.

“Then it is this man who has died
you’d like to see?” she asked.

THE LEGEND OF MARK SHAYNE

231

Shayne laughed in dismal drunken
morbidity.

“Thash right. I’d like to see my
ghost. But I can’t, ’cause he’sh a
ghost — get it?”

“Perhaps he can be called,” said the
old crone.

CHAYNE blinked at her blearily.

“Thash a hot one. Sure, leave a
call for ’em. Tell ’em the guy that
picked him up outta the gutter wansh
full payment on hish contract.”

The juke box started up as some-
one put a nickel in it. Now They Are
Left Behind , was the record. Foggily,
the now too familiar strains came to
Shayne like an eerie answer to his
drunken request. He wheeled on his
bar stool.

“Turn that damned thing off!” he
screamed.

Someone laughed. Shayne grabbed
the bottle at his elbow, rose from the
stool and staggered over to the ma-
chine. With one vicious gesture he
hurled the bottle through the glass panel
of the juke box, smashing the contents
inside. The record, of course, ceased.
The silence was chilling.

“That’ll cost you plenty,” the bar-
tender’s voice came to Shayne. “Or
I’ll call the cops.”

Shayne threw a fifty dollar bill across
the bar. The old crone was at his
side, plucking at his sleeve.

“You would like to see your friend
again?” she whined.

Shayne broke into a fit of laughter.

“Shure, shure thing. Lead me to
him!”

The old crone took his arm, and the
cold night air hit Shayne’s cheeks as
they went out the door. The rest was
a blur until he was climbing worn and
creaking stairs in a darkened, musty
hallway. Then they were in a small,
incense-stinking, poorly-lighted room.

He could see the crone removing her
coat, going to a table, pulling up chairs.

“Sit here,” said the crone, indicating
one of the chairs before the table.

Giggling drunkenly, Shayne stag-
gered over to the table and sat down.
The crone sat opposite, looking at him.

“What is it worth to see your
friend?” she whined.

Shayne pulled out his wallet and
threw his remaining bills on the table.
The crone picked them up eagerly,
eyes lighting. She stuffed them be-
tween her dirty blouse and wrinkled
throat.

“Before we start,” she said. “What
is his name?”

“Johann Gelder,” Shayne muttered
sleepily. He weaved slightly on his
chair. The stifling air of the place
was making him foggier.

“Now we must have silence,” the old
crone whispered.

“No glassh ball?” Shayne muttered.

“Concentrate on silence and your
friend,” the crone whispered.

The silence held for perhaps two
minutes. Then the crone’s voice, as if
from a great distance, whined,

“Johann, Johann Gelder. From your
tomb, Johann — arise!”

Shayne, drunk as he was, felt a chill
caress his spine.

“Johann, Johann Gelder,” the crone’s
voice came faintly, eerily. “Rise from
the nameless mists and come to us.”

The silence stretched for an eternity,
now, and the very unnamed terror
Shayne felt was penetrating his
drunken fog. There was the faintest
murmur of a whine in the darkened
room, and a voice floated weirdly
through the blackness.

“Shayne. Mark Shayne,” whis-
pered the voice. “I hear the calls.”

A/fARK SHAYNE was suddenly
ghastly white. He tried to stand,

232

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

but his knees would not support his
weight. He sank back.

“I am Garth, Shayne,” the voice
came to him. “I am Van Evans Garth.”

“Thash’s not Gelder!” Shayne
choked. “Send him away!”

The voice grew fainter, and the
crone’s thin arm stretched across the
table and her hand closed over Shayne’s
tightly.

“Silence,” she hissed.

There was still a fainter murmuring
whine in the blackness of the room.
This was growing louder.

“Shayne?” a faint whisper sounded.
“Shayne? This is Johann Gelder, come
to you. What is it you want of me?”

There was no mistaking the eerie
half -whisper that floated through the
darkened, stinking little room. It was
the voice of Johann Gelder.

“Songs,” Shayne choked. White
beads of sweat stood out on his brow.
His throat seemed horribly constricted.
It was all he could do to speak. “I want
songs, Gelder.”

The crone withdrew her withered
paw from Shayne’s wrist. The mur-
muring whine grew louder. Johann
Gelder’s voice came more strongly.

“Take . . . this token . . . from
one in the Shades who knew you.”

Something was pressed into Shayne’s
moist palm. He looked across the ta-
ble, but the crone had her arms folded
and her eyes closed.

“Take this token . . . and hear the
songs . . . Shayne ... I leave.” The
voice of Johann Gelder evaporated into
silence. Shayne felt like screaming
after him, but he could only dose his
fist tightly against the object in it.
More seconds of silence. Then the
crone’s voice came sharply.

“That is all. It is finished. They
have left,” she said shrilly.

Shayne rose, dropping the object into
his pocket. He looked wonderingly

around the room, almost uncompre-
hendingly. He swept his hand across
his damp forehead. Then he shuddered
and cursed. He staggered toward the
door lurchingly through an alcoholic
haze, never looking back at the crone.
Somehow he got down that musty hall-
way. A cab driver brought him back
to his terraced apartment hours later —
sickeningly drunk. The elevator boy
carried him into his place and put him
to bed.

AACHEN Shayne awoke, he could
hear someone playing the piano in
the drawing room outside his door.
Vaguely, he remembered the events of
the previous evening. Shakily he got
out of bed, slipped into a robe, and
staggered into the drawing room to see
who the person was he had brought
home with him.

The piano — a luxurious concert
grand — faced his bedroom, and Shayne
had to move around to the side of it
to see who was playing so concertedly
at this time of morning.

The keys were moving. The music
filled the room. But no one sat at that
piano.

It took Shayne fully a minute for
him to comprehend that much. And
in that minute the keys continued to
move fluently, and the music continued
to fill the room.

Then Shayne gasped, backing away,
face whiter than before.

“What is this?” Shayne groaned.

The music continued. The keys rip-
pled onward.

Shayne suddenly stepped to the pi-
ano, viciously jerking down the top that
covered the keys. The music con-
tinued uninterruptedly. And then it
came to Shayne, through the sickness
and terror that he felt, that this was a
composition unfamiliar to him. A song
( Continued on page 238 )

»»»

1 Introducing

«««

THE AUTHOR

Harold Lawlor

I SUPPOSE I ought to start out by suggesting,
with becoming diffidence, that you’ll probably
find this pretty dull reading. But a pox on
such false modesty ! As a matter of fact, I expect
my story will fascinate the daylights out of you.

I was bom in Chicago in — well, maybe I’d better
not tell the year. After all, why wash my dirty
linen in public? But if you insist, it was 1910.
My childhood followed the usual pattern. I rode
around on kiddie cars, and drank orange juice,
and was once kicked in the head by a horse, and
stuff like that. It wasn’t until I went to work
that my past really started to get purple.

My first job, after I was graduated from high
school, was in the traffic department of an im-
porting firm. I did very well for a year, too —
just fine, in fact — until I consigned a freight car
full of stuff meant for Scottsdale, Pennsylvania, to
Scottsdale, Arizona. When my boss started re-
ceiving telegrams from that sleepy little hamlet out
there in Arizona, he was in a pet, let me tell you.
So I went to work for a loan company then.
The loan company people, being Irish, were
smarter; so that job only lasted a month.

After that, I worked three years as a stenog-

rapher in the offices of a freight trucking concern.
And I’d undoubtedly be there yet if they hadn’t
gone bankrupt — an unfortunate occurrence with
which I had absolutely nothing to do. At least,
don’t think so. There were certain sly hints and
veiled insinuations — but you know how people talk.

The next few years were depression years, and
I certainly don’t intend to re-live them — not even
on paper. Besides being out of work, increasing
deafness served to sharpen my sense of futility and
general frustration.

It was during this period that I decided to try
writing because it looked so easy. (Hollow laugh-
ter is indicated right about here.) Boy, do I
ever know better now ! I spent three years writ-
ing, but alas! not selling, love pulps. Also tried
an occasional groaner (confession story, to you.)
This dreary time of rejection slips was not with-
out its humorous moments, though.

Most writers like to reminisce ruefully about
their rejected stories that are returned by the fast-
est freight, but I bet I’m the only writer extant
who had a story come back via airmail. Honestly,
one did. I moped for days. Somehow it seemed
to conjure up a picture of the editor handling my
beloved story with tongs. Or even a ten-foot pole.

Editors! The stories I could tell about them!

(But not Mr. Rap, of course. Nice Mr. Rap
who bought the first story I ever sold, and whom
I certainly do not intend to let out of my clutches.)

But to get back. Since art wasn’t going to
pay so well as I’d thought, when Don Wilcox
offered me a job as his typist last fall I leaped
at the chance. I typed all his manuscripts, and
in practically no time at all, I even wrote one of
my own. Which just goes to show what bad
company will do, and I hope this will be a lesson
to you all.

Working for Don has been highly instructive —
and fun, too (once you get used to his wire jackets
and his blacksnake whips if you make a little
teeny mistake in the typing!) We sometimes talk
over plots — with much loud chatter about en-
chantresses and men without souls and rocket ships
blowing up and what not. It’s got so that not
another tenant in the building will pass our door
without crossing himself first.

And I guess that’s about all. Nope, I’m not
married. And as to my love-life — well, they’re
only allowing me seven hundred words here.

So that’s my life up to now — -but life for me
really began on that day when Mr. Rap said
my story was okay. I hope you’ll like it — and
I hope there’ll be lots more of them in the future.

234

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

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235

READERS PAGE

SOMETHING UNUSUAL?

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Today I purchased the February Fantastic
Adventures — and something very unusual hap-
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“Doorway To Hell” is unquestionably a great
story. It is the best story I have ever read in
Fantastic Adventures.

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929 Butler Street,
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We hope that from now on your reactions to
our magazine are of the “unusual” variety. — Ed.

ALL OTHER STORIES SECOND

Sirs:

Your February issue was one of the best you
have ever put out, and I don’t mean maybe!!
The outstanding story of the issue was “Doorway
To Hell”. All the other stories were tied for
second place. The cover was the best you ever
put out. Are your interior illustrations done
twice the size as they appear in the magazine?

Anthony Ahearn,
3170 Valhalla Place,
The Bronx, N. Y.

Our illustrations are generally done half larger,
although some are twice size. Finlay and Ma-
garian do them same size. — Ed.

NOW HE KNOWSI

Sirs:

After reading the February issue of Fantastic
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way To Hell” was surely the best story that you’ve
printed in your magazine yet. Dune came out
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What a cover! The other stories were so good
it was too hard to rate them, but “The Lady and
the Vampire” came out third.

Thomas Regan, Jr.,
138 Townsend Street,
New Brunswick, N. J.

We are frankly surprised at the reaction to our
latest serial. “Doorway To Hell ” has hit hard,
and we are extremely pleased. We’ll certainly
give you more of this type story! — Ed.

(Reader’s Page is cut short this month, because
of our surprise issue, and the ten great stories
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ADVENTURES

THE LEGEND OF
MARK SHAYNE

( Continued from, page 232 )

he’d never' heard before. And it was
played again and again, in a style that
was positively that of Johann Gelder!

And then the gaps in Shayne’s mem-
ory of the previous evening filled in
completely. His features went from
white to gray.

“Gelder!” Shayne croaked. “My
God ! You’re ghosting again ! ”

The piano reached the end of the
number, hesitated, and started it up
again, repeating the same unfamiliar
song.

And Shayne recalled Gelder’s voice
floating eerily through the gloom of that
unholy room. Hear the songs, Gelder’s
voice had said. Hear this song, it
meant!

Shayne’s jaw was tight, his lips com-
pressed, as he fought back the signifi-
cance of this fantastic music pouring
from his piano. He was sure now that
Gelder was giving him another song.
Why, or how, was a matter Shayne
pushed from his mind.

Almost insanely he began to laugh.
Then he seized up paper and pencil,
strode to the piano bench, threw up the
lid, and began to write swiftly on the
sheets he placed before him.

Two hours later Shayne was still at
it. A small stack of filled music paper
lay at his elbow, and the piano tinkled
on. He had three songs, and was tran-
scribing the fourth. The lyrics came
automatically, as if another hand were
guiding his. own.

AN HOUR after that, utterly ex-
hausted, Shayne had finished. The
piano, the moment he’d transcribed the
last note and lyrics, had ceased also.
Shayne took three stiff highballs to
straighten himself up, and then he
dressed hurriedly. He wasted no time
shaving or bathing.

240

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

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There was a peculiar glint in his eye.
Ten minutes later, when the pianist had
finished the last note on the last num-
ber, Morrison turned to Shayne.

“This,” he pronounced grimly, “is
just what the music business has been
waiting for.”

“You mean?” Shayne choked hope-
fully.

“I mean you’re through, Shayne.
Washed up. We’ve enough dope on
you from this to blackball you in the
music industry for the rest of your life.
Get out of here, you damned skunk,
and don’t poke your nose around again.

Those tunes, all four of them, are due
to be published by John Colder’s outfit
in two weeks. They were written, by
Colentze and Bardine. I don’t know
how in the hell you stole them, or who
sold them to you, but you’ve bitten off
sucker bait. Beat it!”

Dazedly, strickenly, Mark Shayne
left the office. His eyes were slightly
glazed, his mouth half agape, as he rode
back to his terraced apartment. Alone,
he entered his suite. The piano in the
drawing room was playing. The tune
was Now They Are Left Behind.

Shayne didn’t approach the piano as
it played. He knew no one would be
sitting before it.

He went to his bedroom, found the
discarded coat he had worn the night
before. Fishing into the pocket he
pulled forth a hard, square object. It
was the gold-mounted five-do!lar bill
that he had placed in the cold hands of
Van Evans Garth before his burial.

Like a man hypnotized, Shayne
walked through his drawing room and
opened the French doors that led out
to his terrace. Down below him, some
thirty floors, New York shimmered in
the afternoon dusk.

Through the French doors that led to
the drawing room, Shayne could hear
the piano still playing Now They Are
Left Behind. He climbed atop the
parapet railing and stood teetering on
the wind-swept perch. Then he swayed
forward, and down.

In the apartment, the piano stopped
playing . . .

No one ever mentioned the afternoon
Shayne spent with Mike Morrison. Not
even John Colder, who learned of it
shortly after Shayne had left. And the
gold-mounted five-dollar bill must have
been lost in Shayne’s downward plunge.
For after his death it never became a
part of the Mark Shayne Legend.

The End

FANTASTIC ADVENTURES

241

CORRESPONDENCE CORNER

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"Wenbaum Memorial” never opened, autographed
by Raymond A. Palmer. Write Thomas Hoguet,
3671 Broadway, New York City . . . N. E.
Goring, Fredericksburg ,Va., has an Ulca Camera,
in good condition that he will sell cheap . . .
Charles E. Rigdon 1040*4 Leishman Ave., New
Kensington, Pa., age 27, 6 ft. 2 in. tall brown hair
and eyes, desires to correspond with the male sex
between the ages of 21-30 — soldiers or sailors and
readers of science fiction . . . Betty Mystrom 209
West 21st Street, Cheyene, Wyoming, would like
to buy a copy of “The Mysterious Mr. Quinn” by
Agatha Christie. She is 19 years old and would
also like to correspond with people around her
own age or older. Her hobbies are photography,
horseback riding and reading . . . Any fan who
believes he can write stories or SF articles for a
fan magazine get in touch with Tom Ludowitz,
2310 Virginia, Everett, Wash. . . . Ruth Gay
Fallis, 22 Howard Parkway, New Rochelle, N. Y.,
would like to hear from others who enjoy reading
SF. She would like to correspond with anyone
over 18 . . . Gilbert H. Jacobs, 936 East 15 Street,
Brooklyn, N. Y., is desirous of contacting both
male and female, age 18, living in the following
locations: Alaska, South America, any British
Dominion, Crown Colony, et al. His interests
lie in the fields of science and other ideas as glass
blowing . . . Shelley Frend, 2400 Leslie Street,
Detroit, Mich., 20 years of age would like to
correspond with girls from 17-22 . . . Richard
Geney, 218 Fletcher Hall, Ann Arbor, Michigan is
forced to dispose of a large collection of science-
fiction and fantasy magazines at very reasonable
prices. The collection includes Amazing as far
back as 1926, every issue of Fantastic Ad-
ventures, and many others. All are in good
condition . . . Arthur Young, 1710 Montgomery
Avenue, New York, N. Y., wants to correspond
with young people, 18 and over (anyone under
80) and make personal friends with residents of
New York City. He would like to organize a
splendid social and cultural movement interested
in the future. He is not interested in hearing
from persons who are in any way connected with
communist, nazi or fascist organizations. He’ll
answer all letters promptly . . . Hal Velardi, Sub
Base Box 19, Coco Solo, Canal Zone, a sailor
twenty-two yean old, five-feet-seven, likes all
sorts of sport, has brown hair and eyes, would
like to hear from girls all over the world. Others
are welcome to write also . . . S. David, 12
William Street, Maritzburg, Natal, South Africa,
has for exchange cigarette, post and other view
cards, and curios and novelties. Also genuine

BUY

UNITED
STATES
SAVINGS
BONDS
AND STAMPS

ON s\| | vniH’R PfNTOFFICKOR BANK

America On Guard!

Above ie a reproduction of the
Treasury Department's Defense
Savings Poster, showing an exact
duplication of the original “Minute
Man” statue by famed sculptor
Daniel Cheater French. Defense
Bond* and Stamps, on sale at your
bank or post office, are a vital part
of America’s defense preparations.

WHAT CAUSES EPILEPSY?

A booklet containing the opinion* of famous
doctors on this interesting subject will be sent
FREE, while they last, to any reader writing to
the Educational Division, 535 Fifth Ave., New
York, N. Y., Dept. D-4.

lucky charms. Will take in exchange magazines,
books on Occultism preferably, and novelties.
Please send yours . . . George Foust, 169 Little
Albany St., New Brunswick, N. J., 21 years of
age, would like female correspondents as pen pals
about 18 or 19 years old. He is interested in pals
from nearby cities . . . Don Eastman, 236 Law-
ton Terrace, Council Bluffs, Iowa, would like
to trade the book “Tenar of Pelluridar” for “Gods
of Mars” or “Back to the Stone Age” or “Pd-
Iucidar,” all by Burroughs; would also like to buy
science fiction books, please send list . . . Charles
W. Wolfe, 214 Grand Ave., Las Vegas, New
Mexico, would like to hear from anyone who has
for sale a copy of Whitman Pub. Co. book No.
4056, “Tarzan and the Tarzan Twins With Jad-
Bal-Ja, The Golden Lion,” a Big-Big book copy-
right 1936 ... S. M. Ritter, 1160 Simpson St.,
New York City, has 45 sci-fic mags to trade for
others. Will also swap Vol. 1, No. Is and Esquires
for histories, biographies, etc.

r nrrnnr

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Inventor

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SlQ 2D 3D 4 D

Ssn en ?□ ©□

j Just check here and mall
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i Proof of the value and outstand-
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■ PLIANCE is clearly shown by
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NOW/

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Name

Street

City... State

State whether for Men f ] Woman [ ] orCtalldt 1

BROOKS APPLIANCE CO., 152-B State St., Marshall, Mich.

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